Requiem
by kaitlyn15
Summary: Lidia Davis is a forensic pathologist living and working in Boston. In the midst of her crumbling personal life she finds herself having to choose between aiding the fugitive vigilantes who’s methods she secretly condones, or playing it safe...
1. Chapter 1

Lidia Davis is a forensic pathologist living and working in Boston. In the midst of her crumbling personal life she finds herself having to choose between aiding the fugitive vigilantes who's methods she secretly condones, or playing it safe and preserving not only her job but her life.

Chapter 1

I am an excellent bull-shitter. But sadly, I wasn't born with that ability. Like any other skill it had to be honed. I did most of my "honing" in my senior year of high school. My father had died of a genetic degenerative lung disease that January. I had waited for him to die for six hellish years, and when I finally buried his frail body that spring when the ground had thawed enough to dig up my, "honing" was already in full swing.

The sense of regained freedom I felt was altogether morbid and overwhelming. I spent the majority of my free time, those last few months of that year, bar-hopping with a gaggle of skanks I affectingly called my new found friends, and then spent almost every Monday morning projectile vomiting and sleeping off a hangover. Needless to say my mother was less than enthused about my new hobby, but that did nothing to hinder it. I just got good at lying.

I would stumble in the house on any given night, and face my mother's irate bout of endless questioning flawlessly. She would have no choice but purse her lips and narrow her eyes in frustration. I knew she thought she'd outsmart me someday, I figured she would eventually, but she never managed to catch me in a single lie.

By the time I had gotten into college my night-life had calmed down quite a bit. In fact it was virtually nonexistent. I had had my fill of partying away my grief.

I had always thought of my exceptional ability to lie believably as superfluous. That was until I took my first college level English class.

Out of all the useless classes they ever forced me to take in college, I hated English the most. I loathed it. Being fluent in bullshit I recognized how much bullshit the class entailed, and let me tell you, it was quite a bit. We read book after book of useless and highly depressing subject matter. I also came to realize all the bullshit concepts authors like to throw into the monstrosities they called their works of literary fiction. For example the literary concept of the cleansing nature of fire, being that if the protagonist's house burns to the ground in an electrical fire it actually means that the protagonist is being freed from the monotony of his premeditated life and thrust him into a world of endless opportunities, rather than simply leaving him homeless.

With my experience with fire, it's anything but cleansing. The first time I examined a severely burned cadaver was the only time I vomited during a class. I get maybe two to four fire deaths a month. Thankfully the bodies are rarely burned like the scorched man whose smell made me excuse myself with a frenzied wave of my hand as the professor asked me if I was going to be alright. Most deaths resulting from a fire are caused by the prolonged inhalation of toxic gasses.

But sometimes, even as an expert bull-shitter, I struggle to force the lies out believably. Sometimes the situation is so ridiculous it takes all I have to keep my composure as I feel my lips forming around the lies. But sometimes you just have to spit it out, to say things like "What the author means here is that the fire that destroyed the protagonist's earthly positions actually liberated him from a life of, insert mindless regurgitated babble here." Or "I'm so sorry for your loss Mrs.Yakavetta. What befell your son in that court room was monumentally tragic."

* * *

Deborah leaned against the door frame of my office, flipping through a manila folder. 

"Jesus, took em' long enough to send these eh?" She mumbled, still flipping through the carbon copies of shot records and prescription paper-work.

"Look at this; back in 96 our little friend got prescribed some good-ole Oxycontin."

Deborah worked here some five years before I showed up. She was a pathologists assistant when I came along, assisting the former pathologist Dr. Murray. And I'll admit, she's better at this job than I am. Maybe it's because she'd been doing this longer than I have, but that's probably wishful thinking.

"Why would our beloved Mr. Yakavetta be in need of narcotic pain relievers?" I said with sarcastic interest.

"Your guess is as good as mine. I mean, he was only a worthless murderous peice of shit." Deb answered with an amused smirk.

I pushed my chair away from my desk and my small mountain of neglected paperwork. The wheels under my chair squeaked as they rolled over the lime-green linoleum.

"Well, you've successfully distracted me." I sighed.

"If you're as excited to go over these as I am, why don't we give Dr. Kevorkian a call. Maybe set up an appointment?"

"I wonder if he takes walk-in's." I added with a chuckle.

"But honestly, we'll be here all night. There set to bury him tomorrow you know." She said with a sobering note in her voice that extinguished my amusement.

"Closed casket by the looks of him" she added with a grin.

I pursed my lips, but tried not to let her see my annoyance. She caught on.

"Ohh that's right, I forgot you take yourself too seriously." She huffed with mock anger.

I glared up at her as I pushed my squeaky chair back toward my desk and reluctantly prepared to do battle once again with the paperwork monster. Her grin only widened in mischievous glee. She turned on her heal and strode out of my office.

"Enjoy your paperwork. Call me when you're ready to kill yourself." She called over her shoulder.

"Will do." I called back.

* * *

I didn't mean to be sensitive about what we do. Deb meant no harm in her teasing, and with what we see on a daily basis I think we owed it to ourselves to be insensitive about it every now and again or we'd go insane. And it's not that I had any respect for Yakavetta, I had no illusions about him or any of the horrible things he had done. Truth be told, I think he really got what was coming to him, but I would have never admitted that outwardly, at least not then. I suppose it all stemmed from the things I had drilled into me in college.

The second cadaver I dissected was an averagely built man of about 70 years of age. My lab group consisted of three other students. We each took turns on different systems of the body. I was assigned the Cardio-Pulmonary area, and so I went first. I examined the heart and the lungs, weighed them and made my external observations of them. The next student was assigned the endocrine system, but when he removed the liver he raised it over his head and proclaimed to his friend apparently named Dave who was busy sawing the breast plate off his cadaver "Hey, go long."

My professor dragged that student out of the room by his lab coat. I never forgot what he said when he returned.

"These people have given you a gift. If you can't respect that than you don't deserve to be here."

I don't think the people who get rolled into this place gave me a gift, least of all Yakavetta, but I made it a practice to treat them with respect. I know it sounds cheesy.

But that doesn't mean that I don't hate him. But there's nothing left in that mangled corpse to hate.

* * *

I glanced at the clock, again. They weren't that late, but I was anxious, I always hated this end of things.

I flipped through my manila folder filled with a copy of my final report and the paper work I needed Mr. Yakavetta's grieving mother to sign. I'd flipped through the same papers a dozen times, futilely trying to pacify my racing head.

I heard the hallow sound of Deborah's heals on the linoleum. She leaned on my doorframe once again her mischievous grin was replaced with a sympathetic, understanding smile.

"Paul's here." She said.

I sighed

"All right, show them in."

I'd forgotten that Paul was accompanying them, and although the thought of having a friend present as I went about the whole sad affair once again was comforting, it did little to improve my wounded mood. I would still have to lie my sympathies believably.

I straightened my jacket, tightened my grip on the manila folder in hand, and stepped out.

How bad could this really be?

* * *

The short silver haired old women buried her wrinkled head into the slightly taller mans chest, which did something to muffle her panicked sobs but not much. They still echoed off the cold metallic walls of the examining room with irritating precision. I wanted more than anything to share an annoyed look with Paul who stood stoically next to the other man, presumably Yakavetta's younger brother, but feared being spotted.

The oldest brother being preoccupied with consoling his hysterical mother did not so much as glance at the corpse of his brother, but the younger boy had no such distraction. His attention was focused undividedly on the marred body.

There was no point in trying to cover what was left Joseph Yakavetta's face. The gore of his head bled through the thin starchy white fabric of the medical sheets we would otherwise use to conceal the deceased's features when they weren't being scrutinized in identification or in external examination. But seeing the twin pools of coagulated blood and liquefied brain matter soak visibly through the sheet was just as disturbing. Yakavetta's head was propped into position with small steal block that had been adjusted to accommodate it. The ruin of his head was pointed directly upward, facing the buzzing industrial lights above us. His eyes and the crown of his nose had been blow out leaving gaping holes that were almost impossible to tell apart.

The old woman's howling grew shriller. I shot a glance at Deb, mentally pleading with her to end our now pointless session with the corpse. She pursed her lips but nodded reluctantly. Deb painted her sympathetic mask of sincerity flawlessly on her face; she was a much better actress than I was. She raised her hand and meekly placed it on the woman's heaving shoulder. Without saying a word she steered the inconsolable woman and the surviving son she furiously clung to toward the door. They clumsily stumbled their way to it as Yakavett's mother kept her head firmly buried in her son's broad chest, sobbing and sputtering in broken and heavily accented English.

The younger man lingered, examining his brother's corpse with wide and weary eyes. It seemed he couldn't bear to look at his ruined face for his eyes wandered desperately across his brother's cold flesh. I felt a pang of genuine sorrow for him. Without the production his mother was making to distract me, I could see that he was no older than nineteen. Brown eyed and attractive, he was averagely tall and hadn't seemed to have inherited his brothers' bulldoggish musculature. His brown eyes lingered at his brother's collapsed diaphragm and welled with bloodshot tears. He blinked them back furiously and angled his face from the corpse.

Paul took a graceful step forward and placed his large hand over the boy's slumped shoulder.

"If you'd like some time alone…" Paul stated his voice husky with sincere concern for the young man.

"No, it's fine." The boy answered swiftly. He didn't meet Paul's gaze, but he shook his head as he said it, as if the prospect of being alone with the mangled corpse was more trauma than he took take.

"Maybe we should get some air then." Paul said, patting the boys shoulder twice.

The boy nodded in silent agreement. Without a parting glance at the body he and Smecker strode out. Sometimes I forgot how perceptive Paul could be. He knew what to say in awkward moments such as this, whereas I just stood there with my proverbial thumb up my ass. The sorrowful feeling I felt for the boy hit me again as I watched him plunge his hands into his jean pockets and stride out of the frigid examining room in silence. But a new feeling accompanied it now. Guilt flooded my heart as I thought of the other corpse lying in a dark refrigerated storage locker with the name David Della Rocco scrawled on the index card that labeled it.

I glanced down at Yakavetta's lifeless shell, at his limp hands whose nails were the same blue shade that his lips had turned. Those hands took so many lives; those lips spoke the orders that slaughtered. Yakavetta's family didn't deserve my pity. Maybe that's unfair of me, to condemn his loved ones. Surly their pain was in equal measure to those like David's family, but to me their tears seemed tainted by Yakavetta's sins.

* * *

Deb stopped in as just as I was kicking the brakes of the gurney up so I could wheel Yakavetta back into his locker.

"I'll be right in." I said when she popped her head in the door.

"Don't bother." She said with a yawn.

"She still at it?" I whispered, referring to Yakavetta's mother and her incessant wailing.

Deb nodded and exaggeratedly rolled her eyes.

"But Paul's taken over the paper work, so they'll be outta here pretty soon." Deb continued.

"Ahh, the perks of having FBI friends" I sighed. Even the prospect of not having to pour over paperwork with the sobbing mother of a murder couldn't brighten my mood.

* * *

With the paperwork signed and filed, the pseudo-sympathies said and the surveying Yakavetta family shipped off to make the final funeral arrangements, me and Deb busied ourselves with our own paperwork, preparing to turn custody of Yakavetta's corpse over to his family. Paul tagged along, following us as we buzzed about from room to room.

He didn't initiate small talk to justify his presence. I credited this to the draining amount of work he must have fallen into during the last few weeks. Certainly he must have been swamped. His uncharacteristic silence continued as he followed me to my office.

I flopped into my squeaky chair with a sigh. Paul rubbed his temples and grimaced. I recognized the painful onslaught on a headache and pulled open the second drawer of my desk. I groped the metal interior of the drawer for the worn leather of my purse. Seeing it Paul's expression changed, his sarcasm seemed to revive itself for a moment.

"Jesus Lidia, how old is that thing?" He asked with a croaky chuckle.

"I'm ashamed to say." I admitted with an uncomfortable smirk.

After fishing around in the depths of my ancient purse I finally located the small bottle of aspirin I kept. I tossed over to Paul he snatched it out of the air with a clatter of pills off the plastic interior.

He nodded his thanks and shook two pills out of the bottle. I handed him the half full bottle of water that sat on the far corner of my desk. He popped both pills in his mouth and took a swig of the water.

Grimacing he said "Yum, warm."

I smiled despite my lousy mood.

"So, how's William?" He asked, glancing at my naked ring finger.

"Good." I said flatly.

The look that flashed across Paul's face was unconvinced.

"I think he's fucking my cousin." I added.

"Which one?" He asked with a frown.

I was surprised with his level headedness at my little revelation. I was still trying to find a way to tell Deb about my crumbling relationship with my fiancé without inducing an endless bout of "OH MY GOD"s and "NO WAY"s. Paul on the other hand took the news with stoic attentiveness. It was overwhelmingly refreshing.

"Christina, my father's sister's daughter." I admitted shamefully.

"Isn't that a little…."

"Incestuous? Why yes, yes it is." I finished. The realization of how my pathetically my personal life was crumbling down around me was suddenly illuminated. I propped my elbow on my desk, shoving my miniature mountain of paper work aside, and rubbed my achy eyes. I felt the beginnings of a lump form in my throat but I fought it back.

I was jarred back from my plunge into self pity by the warmth of Paul's hand as it wrapped around mine. I felt a sudden flush of embarrassment knowing that he felt the need to console me.

"Sorry Kiddo." He said squeezing me hand as it lay limply in his.

"Let's get some lunch." He mumbled, obviously trying to dodge a bout of awkward silence we both felt coming a mile away. I nodded my agreement, not trusting voice to remain steady as the lump dissolved slowly.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

The Rose diner is about three blocks away from the local morgue that I call my workplace. Its nothing spectacular, the floors and tabletops are in a constant and mysterious state of stickiness and the food is little better than that of the average truck stop. But it's convenient considering I usually don't have much time for lunch and the waitress likes me and special treatment is always nice.

Paul's uncharacteristic silence melted slightly as the ride over was occupied with shallow small talk. He didn't press me about my suspension of William's infidelity which I was endlessly grateful for. I knew the subject would eventually arise again but I trusted that Paul knew to keep his mouth shut about it, at least for now. Eventually the awkwardness broke through our feeble attempts to hold it back, but thankfully the diner was in sight when the silence engulfed us.

I grimaced; it was so unlike Paul to let silence taint a conversation that my heart fluttered almost painfully in nervous frustration as we silently filed out of Paul's car and up the crumbling concrete steps. The derelict wind chime that hung from the flimsy porches' ceiling was jostled awake by a gust of frigid wind. It clamored weakly and inharmoniously. I grasped my thin jacket closer to me. The much welcomed heat of the diner wafted out at me as Paul heaved its heavy door open. These last few weeks of March had been cold, but not necessarily uncharacteristically. In Boston the weather was harsh and largely unpredictable, unlike in Pennsylvania the snowfall here was minimal, but the frigid air lingered until well into the spring months.

It was late in the afternoon and the diner was all but empty of costumers. A radio murmured in the kitchen over the clattering of dishwashing, blaring some irritatingly overplayed song. Paul hesitated, obviously unsure if he should wait for a waitress to seat us.

"Go ahead" I mumbled urging him onward.

He smiled weakly at me before continuing into the diner in large strides. He seated us in a middle booth against the yellowed wallpapered wall. I threw my ancient purse into the booth then stripped off my coat and flung it atop it before settling into my seat. The old red faux-leather groaned against me earning a crooked smirk from Paul.

"Don't even start." I said, recognizing the flash of amusement that gleamed across his eyes. But the gleam faded unnaturally fast, leaving the cold tired stare that had dominated his expression that day. I felt my lips purse but I kept my mouth shut.

Kathleen burst through the kitchen door just then, sparing us from another bout of awkwardness. Her genuine pleasure in seeing me ignited her green-grey eyes despite her somber disposition.

By my approximation Kathleen was about fifty, although she looked over sixty. Years of living near the poverty line had taken their toll on her face. Her skin wrinkled beyond repair with age, cigarette smoke, and suffering. Her face was unremarkable in most ways. Her once regal straight noise knotted at its bridge, a tell-tale symptom of an old, yet sever brakeage. Kathleen made her way toward us as soon as her cloudy eyes had detected us.

She walked with a slight limp, wincing when her weight was directed on her left leg which wobbled slightly under her as though it were new.

* * *

When I first made the movie to Boston I was hermetic. The only acquaintances that I had made were that of coworkers (who were less than ecstatic about my rookie invasion of their workplace and were being pseudo polite and patient with me out of necessity) and Kathleen, the limping, aged waitress. I would sit on my lunch break, neglected by the coworkers whom I annoyed with my greenness, and gaze up at the Rose's antique stamped tin ceiling. The geometric shapes imprinted on the flimsy and semi-rusted trough metal made me dizzy, but kept me occupied in a sad kind of way. Kathleen kept me company on the days that I must have looked exceptionally pathetic. We made small talk mostly, but I was thankful for anything that felt even slightly natural and unforced. It took me three months of polite lunch-time conversation to well up enough courage to ask Kathleen how she had injured her leg. When I finally blurted my inquiry out I felt my face grow hot as I waited on her reaction nervously. She sighed; apparently slightly annoyed at being coned into explaining her limp once again, but a sad triumphant smile sprung to her lips as though she knew the question was eventual.

Her nonchalant answer shocked me.

"My son gave me this." She said as she slapped her fragile knee with the flat of her palm. Her face took the form of a placid mask and her voice was unwavering as she reiterated the whole horrible story.

It came as quite a shock to Kathleen to realize that her 23 year old son Shawn had a slight methamphetamine habit. Kathleen found him cowering in the far corner of her tiny kitchen, his bare feet quivering on the peeling linoleum. All Kathleen's attempts to rouse her son from his daze went unrewarded. She sprang from the room, leaving her convulsing son's side for a moment in order to call paramedics. Kathleen had just enough time to dial the last few digits before her Shawn reached her. In the few seconds it took Kathleen to leave his side and reach the phone Shawn had replaced his convulsing yet harmless state and had adopted a rage with which he directed at his mother unyieldingly. In a matter seconds Shawn had overpowered Kathleen and had begun to deliver vicious and devastating blows to Kathleen's body, kicking in three of her rips, one of which came terrifyingly close to lacerating her liver, breaking her noise and her lower left ocular ridge, and shattering her left kneecap beyond repair.

Shawn now lives in a state funded facility. His crime against his mother was far too heinous to warrant a simple stint in a county prison or probationary period. If he's a good boy he'll be realized in three years. Kathleen now lives in a smaller apartment, waiting tables six out of seven days of the week, shuffling from table to table; functioning as well as her broken body allows her.

* * *

I made small talk with Kathleen as always, I forced it a little. Taking extra care to smile and giggle and nod. Even if it was a little artificial I felt my heart lift a little but one glance at Paul sent it plummeting again. His smile was far more mechanical than mine, unable to reach his eyes. His face looked plastic and tarnished with weariness. Kathleen took our orders, mine was bland, a sandwich and a small plain salad. Paul simply waved off the prospect of food and politely asked for black coffee. Kathleen hobbled away to oblige and I was free to interrogate Paul about it.

"I already ate." He stated simply

I didn't buy that, but I let it drop.

"How's Deborah?" He blurted, obviously trying to direct the conversation away from himself. I played along; hoping my willingness to indulge him would prompt an actual explanation about his behavior.

"She's fine. Bubbly and hyperactive…"

"As always" He added.

I smiled, a genuine smiled this time. His use of humor, weak as it might be, was a good sign. It meant that he was relaxing.

"So, she doesn't know about…" Paul asked, gesturing with his hand.

I didn't follow.

"William?" He whispered

"Ohh, well, no. I know I should tell her. She keeps asking about him. I don't know what to say." I said, feeling my face grow hot.

"Just tell her, you told me."

"Yes but…your you, and Debs Deb." I explained sheepishly. Deborah was one of my closest friends, and it hurt me to admit that I hesitated to tell her about my fiancé's infidelity. I just didn't think I could handle it if she made a production about it.

"Do you regret going to school and doing what you do?" He asked suddenly, throwing me completely off guard.

"No. I mean, it's not the most pleasant thing to make a living at sometimes, but I imagine that there are worse things."

Where was he going with this, I was starting to lose my patience. Each line of questioning became less focused and more urgent than the last. His behavior was starting to seriously worry me. He must have sensed my unease because he drew a deep breath and evened out his tone. I imagined that this was his professional voice because it was cold and calm and unnatural.

"I have never questioned myself about what I do, until this Yakavetta thing."

I gawked at him, saying nothing because I could think of nothing to say, at least nothing that sounded the least bit sincere.

"I helped them." He stated, folding his hands across the tarnished finish of the table.

He squeezed them together so tightly the skin on his knuckles stretched paper thin and white. The flesh of his upper right arm shook noticeably, and I was disturbed by that slight vibration of the muscle of his arm, I feebly tried to convince myself it could be credited to the force in which he clenched his hands together but that left only the question why did he feel the need to clench them so unbearably tightly. His face tightened and the shaking in his arm slowly smoothed itself. I felt the sneaking suspicion that the control Paul gained over his unruly quivering arm was essentially sheer willpower. A thrill of sheer terror washed through me. This was something I feared I was far more serious than anything that I could have imagined.

The pause continued to grow, filling the room with terrifying speed. Paul looked up at me starring into my face for some reaction that I couldn't give. I didn't understand what he was trying to tell me, but I knew it was serious. He was confessing something, and awaiting my response with fear plainly written on his face. I just was not grasping his meaning, and he instantly became frustrated. I froze as anger flashed behind his eyes. The insecure young women in me was painfully convinced that that anger was my doing, that my feeble mind was just not processing the information that Paul was trying so hard get me to comprehend. The anger cooled behind his eyes, but did not extinguish. A determination sprung into them as he raised his gaze dead into my face.

"The Saints. I helped the Saints murder Yakavetta."

He said it slowly, peering into my eyes all the while with disturbing collectiveness. He was joking, surely. But my mind peeled back to the quivering in his upper arm. I had never seen his demeanor deteriorated to anything less than completely confident. That little shake betrayed so much, and nausea swept over me faster than I had expected.

* * *

I have no memory of sprinting out of the front door, but I remember that the flat of my palm ached sourly assumedly from where my hands had slammed open the door. I dry heaved over the unbalanced railing of the Rose's concrete porch. My head spun unbearably and my stomach cramped so badly that it hobbled me, rendering me completely unable to move my feet, let alone turn and face Paul as he undoubtedly came to confront me. I felt the hot air of the restaurant waft at my back as the door swung open much less violently than seconds before. I stiffened whishing with all my might that Paul would have just stayed in the restaurant and let me compose myself as I undoubtedly eventually would. The hands that grasped my shoulders were surprisingly small and light. I glanced over my shoulder at Kathleen who straightened me with surprising ease and gentle guidance from her hands.

"Sweetheart, are you alright?" she asked, eyeing me with shock and concern.

"Yeah, I'm so sorry. I haven't been feeling well today, it must me something going around." I swallowed another bout of sickness and forced a pathetic and sincerely apologetic smile.

Kathleen eyed me, clearly unconvinced with my explanation, but she patted my shoulder comfortingly.

"Could you tell Paul I'd like to go back now? I don't trust myself to go back inside." I said, mopping away the sweat that had collected on my now clammy forehead.

"Certainly, sweetheart. You're not going back to work, are you?" She asked, her meticulously plucked eyebrow arching in disbelief.

"I don't have a choice. We're swamped." I explained simply.

Kathleen pursed her lips but thankfully pushed the subject no further.

"All right then." She sighed dramatically and with one last pathetic pat of my shoulder she turned on her heal and strode into the dinner to collect Paul. I was shocked but immensely thankful that Paul had given me some time to calm myself, but I was unsure if I was really the one who was in need of calming. Perhaps his lack of immediate action wasn't really directed at me at all. What must he have thought when I hauled ass out the Rose?

I clutched the hollow piping that served as the stair railing with both of my hands, concentrating on keeping my shaking legs from giving out from under me. I reached Paul's car just as the bitter wind induced another bout of shivering. I pulled on the plastic handle and nothing. Paul had locked the doors, naturally.

"God-Damn-it!" I huffed spinning around to lean on the frigid door. I crossed my arms over my chest, hoping to quell my shivering just as the dinner door swung open. Paul strode out with Kathleen close behind him. As Kathleen lingered just over the threshold Paul turned to face her. He groped for his wallet in the inner pocket of his jacket and withdrew two bills from it. I couldn't make out just how much he offered Kathleen but by the flustered look that washed over Kathleen's face it was a bit more than what she had expected, if she had expected anything. Her cheeks burned bright red as she withdrew the bills from Paul's hand and mumbled her thanks. I knew she was hurting to bad for money to even attempt the noble act. Paul turned and strode down the derelict concrete steps with ease. Kathleen glanced at me over Paul's descending shoulder. I smiled back at her and she returned it, her embarrassment shallowly hidden. She closed the door and disappeared into its smoky depths.

I looked at my feet as Paul approached, unable to meet his gaze. He unlocked his door in silence and flicked the inner mechanism that unlocked my door. I turned and jarred the door open, sliding into the car with my eyes still vehemently averted.

Needless to say the ride back to the morgue was a completely silent and endlessly uncomfortable. Well, at least I imagined it must have been quite uncomfortable, I was far too preoccupied with absorbing the shocking severity of what Paul had confessed in me than in meticulously analyzing the conversation, or lack thereof. Sometimes my stomach would sink and panicked nausea filled the void it left. I could picture myself fidgeting in the cramped and uncomfortable chair squeezed inside the polished mahogany witness stand, trying to keep my breaking voice steady. It bounced back at me with surprising precision, revealing its helpless meekness as I answered the repetitive questions barked at my by the cross examiner, unable to meets Paul's defeated gaze as he sat shackled and jump-suited, sipping silently out of his water glass.

My throat tightened in a knot I felt almost ashamed in having. But when I realized how easily our roles in my fantasy worst case scenario could be reversed a hot anger built up inside of me, melting the emotional lump almost instantly. The anger continued to build, the harsh words scratching the back of my throat, but I chocked them down, fearful that if I did not restrain myself the verbal onslaught would be fearsome and catastrophic; and although I was immensely angry with Paul over a great number of things pertaining to this whole business, I did not in the least wish to annihilate our friendship as the rage-full and colorful words bouncing around my head surly would.

I snuck a glance at Paul, but he failed to meet my gaze. Instead he directed his complete attention on the road. I continued to shiver, and readjusted my arms around my chest in a desperate attempt to capture as much body heat as I could. I didn't dare touch the shiny dials on the pristine dash board, neurotically fearful that the sudden movement would call Paul's unwanted attention, thrusting us into yet another unwanted conversation that I was sourly unprepared for.

Paul continued to sit rigidly, his jaw clenched tightly, causing his facial muscles to protrude, adding a chillingly intimidating air to his already unsubtle features. His long fingers wrapped around the smooth grey plastic of the steering wheel with almost all their force. At precisely ten and two his hands hardly moved as they steered.

The sun blazed platinum behind the sheet of smog and clouds, casting a bleak light that paled everything and everyone it touched. The dank and disheveled townhouses seemed alien in the bleak contrast the day shed. When I had freshly relocated to Boston it astonished me how the decent neighborhoods could bleed almost seamlessly into the bad neighborhoods. The Rose Dinner was located in one such unsavory neighborhood, whereas the morgue was located in a slightly better one. I watched as the homes gradually morphed from small, bleak apartments to larger more ascetically pleasing houses.

The car slowed to a smooth stop before I realized. I wasn't ready. Paul shifted it into park. I crushed the sudden urge that pleaded me to open the door and flee, take refuge in my office. I took a steadying breath and turned to him. No going back now.

"Why did you tell me this?" I asked simply, visibly catching him off guard. He was in the process of rubbing his eyes with the heels of both his hands when I blurted the question. He lowered them awkwardly.

"I am now wishing I hadn't." was his answer. His voice sounded strange in the small confines of the vehicle. It seemed too clear and too forced. He didn't face me, staring directly ahead. I kept my gaze unflinching, silently urging him to continue, that answer was not expectable and could not be all he intend to say on the matter.

"I wouldn't have told you this if I could have helped it. I mean, Not that I don't trust you." He explained hastily, glancing at me for the first time.

"I told you this because I need to ask a favor of you. This is by no means a demand; I know I'm putting you in a dangerous position…."

"No, you don't know!" My temper flared involuntarily. I felt my cheeks grow hot in aggravation, but I did my best to shake it off. I had to remain calm or this conversation would capsize. Once Paul had given me a moment to calm myself he continued.

"If I regret anything about this, I regret putting you in danger." He turned to me as he said it, conveying his sincerity with an unflinching stare. I nodded, suddenly and inexplicably ashamed of my anger. The lump strangled my throat once again, choking my line of questioning into non-existence.

"I'm sure you'd like to know why I did what I did, and I think you deserve to know. I promise I will explain everything when this is all over, but for right now I need you to do this one thing for me."

"Okay?" I managed to croak.

"The first thing that I think you need to know is that they are not bad people." He stated, I could only assume in reference to the saints.

"So they're not bad people, they just do bad things." My anger began to rise again, but I pacified it as effectively as I could. I wanted to give him a chance to explain himself before I bombarded him with my "how could you's" and "what were you thinking's".

He didn't acknowledge my opinionated outburst, probably well aware of his inability to defend his actions rationally.

"I'm helping them out of the country, and they have a friend now in residence in one of your little refrigerated boxes. David Della Rocco. He was found murdered on Yakavetta's residence."

I nodded my head dumbly, remembering the little index card with his named scrawled on it that adorned his cold stainless steel locker.

"Attending his funeral is obviously out of the question."

"So you want me to allow three very wanted murderers to waltz into my workplace to visit their deceased little friend?" I asked, my anger now building uncontrollably.

"Pretty much." Paul stated dryly.

I pulled open the car door. The cold air soothing on my burning face.

"I'll think about it." I answered as I stepped out.

* * *

_Wow, sorry this took like forever. Hopefully I can get the next chapter up before the apocalypse, but I'm not promising anything. So here's the deal, I kind of fell out of the habit of answering reviews a while back and I'd like to start to again. I hope it doesn't seem creepy._

_Sith Happens: My only reviewer tear. I swear to god the Saints make an apperence in the next chapter, please dont kill me! Thanks for all the encouragement, it is really appreciated! Good luck with you English college major, I only have to take two college English classes and I'm trying not to kill myself on a day to day basis._


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

The rest of my day passed horrendously slowly. My sever change in mood did not go unnoticed.

"I got sick at lunch." I admitted, hoping my feeble excuse would sufficiently cover my ass.

"No wonder!" was Deb's reply.

"That place is nasty. Why you still go there is beyond me."

I fought the urge to roll my eyes and dove back into my paperwork.

"Just don't give it to me. The last thing I need is to be yakking all over the place."

I forced a smile and hoped that its unconvincing nature would be credited to my phantom stomach flu. Weather it was my damaged mood or the threat that my faux illness posed, Deborah left me alone for the dreary remainder of the day. I could occasionally hear her banging around in the examining rooms doing god only knew what, but I was completely focused on successfully scaling Mt. Paperwork, and before I realized it, I had.

Suddenly I was left with nothing to distract me from the strange situation I found myself thrust into. I felt my thin shroud of calmness begin to unravel.

A wave of suppressed anger washed over me, bringing with it a tide of volatile thoughts. How could Paul put me in such a position? What made these people, criminals really, worth putting himself, and not to mention _me_, in danger? Because they were "Good People"? The last time I checked "Good People" considered murder a fairly large no-no. Even if society wasn't exactly mourning over the loss of Yakavetta and his like, it didn't make the Saints heroes. The one thing that I knew for sure was that I was hell bent to get the explanation Paul has promised me, I just hoped it wasn't as feeble as I imagined it would be.

Despite the unsettling nature of all these factors my decision had surprisingly remained unmade. By the way Paul had approached me so suddenly and solemnly I could only assume that time was a definite factor, whether that meant Paul was evacuating these people out of the US much sooner than he had suggested, or Mr. Rocco's remains were to be buried in relatively short order. Either situation required a fairly timely response, one that I was unsure I could give.

A sudden urge to pee overwhelmed me. I let my mind fade once again into a misty gloom of uncertainty as I rose from my squeaky office chair and headed toward the bathroom. I took my time, not desiring to step back into my office to commence another chapter of excruciating decision making. I glanced into the streaky mirror as I washed my hands. My complexion always seemed paler inside the building, I could only credit this to the harsh artificial lighting and cold temperature the establishment called for. The building was old, and the individual lockers that stored the cadavers, along with the examining rooms are refrigerated, but the many small gaps under the doors and poor insulation allowed the cold air from both the refrigerated rooms and from the bitter outside to seep in and contaminate the rest of the building with uncomfortable coolness. My hands were always in a state of frigidness and the sensitive skin around my eyes seemed to tighten. The frigid air not only sapped the moisture from my skin, but also my hair. Only a few hours anywhere near the examining rooms left my hair in a state of limp deadness that I simply could not revive. I got lucky today though, the sort amount of time I spent in the examining room hadn't completely murdered my hair, but it did seem seriously wounded.

I made the short trip down the hall to my office a considerably longer one, walking as slowly as I could. The sight of the pile of conquered paper work stacked neatly for once on my desk did little to lighten my mood. It seemed that I was fresh out of petty distractions to fill my time. I probably had three more hours to kill before I could feasibly expect Deb to let me go home a bit early. Defeated I flopped into my office chair, inducing a din of tuneless squeaks and squeals which only momentarily intensified when I kicked my way toward my idle computer. It groaned to life, the loud mutterings of its inner mechanisms a welcome white noise in an otherwise vacuum like silence.

The internet always offered an escape, a sort of mindless, brain numbing escape, but an escape none the less. I spent the majority of the three hours checking and rechecking my e-mail. I received about eighteen forwarded messages from my grandmother, each more disturbing than the last. They generally included pictures of bunnies and puppies in baskets with little sickeningly sweet little limericks attached, but sandwiched between them were three or four e-mails that detailed complete sections out of the bible coupled with cheesy paintings of Jesus. I reminded myself to thank my mother for teaching her how to use the internet.

A gust of frigid air blew up the dim hallway and across my skin. This was always the result of the use of the backdoor. I could only assume that the gentlemen from the funeral home accompanied by a few spare police officers had arrived to collect Yakavetta's corpse. Muffled voices reverberating down the hall and into my office verified my suspicion. If I was in a better state of mind I would have been tempted to aid Deb as she undoubtedly struggled to see that the paperwork was signed to the satisfaction of the law before Yakavetta's remains were totted away. This was not always an easy task, the Boston police generally carrying an air of being impossibly inconvenienced at the slightest task. Their incessant bitching and moaning could tempt even the most anal of us to sigh "fuck-it" and fudge the paperwork themselves. Sadly such action was quite severely frowned upon by the legal system, and considering the high profile nature of Mr. Yakavetta's situation that kind of indiscretion could prove disastrous.

It only took about half an hour for the muffled voices to fade into silence and for the already scarce warmth to revive itself after the clattering of the gurney had faded along with the slamming of doors and groaning of vehicles. The Boston officers must not have put up that much of a fuss, I suspected that they were as eager to be done with the whole affair as we were.

Deborah popped her head into my office a few minutes later, perfect ringlets of dark hair hanging past the door knob. I pushed my burning envy away, as usual.

"Hey!" She greeted enthusiastically.

"Hey." I answered.

"Feeling better?"

"A little."I lied.

"That was surprisingly quick." I stated, returning my gaze to the humming monitor.

"Sure was, but I would exactly call it painless." Replied Deb stiffening a yawn.

"Is it ever?"

"It's getting late and I figured there's really no point in keeping you here, feeling how you do."

I glanced at her, painting a feeble smile of thanks on my face.

"So, I'll see you tomorrow." Said Deb, her head receding out of the doorway only to snap back inside.

"And don't throw up!" She commanded with amusement.

"I'll try." I answered slightly annoyed with her unintentional refusal to leave.

* * *

I landed in a heap on my newly shampooed carpet, my right knee promptly grinding my cat's grey fluff of a tail into said carpet. She yelped and screeched and bounded off as soon as I released her. She tried to make another mad dash out of the front door as soon as I opened it and was striding in, wiggling her body around my legs in a desperate attempt to fulfill her all consuming obsession of gaining knowledge of the outside world.

I kneeled awkwardly and finally gained my feet with a grown. I caught a glimpse of my face in the dim surface of a picture frame hanging on my pale plane wall. I saw the weariness in my eyes and the happiness of the vaguely familiar faces endlessly peering out at me. My friends, my mother and father, my half sister on her wedding day. I left their smiling faces to resume their silent vigil of the hallway.

I felt my way to the kitchen, flipped on the buzzing light and sloughed some spagattie o's into a bowl and then into the microwave. The microwave gowned awake as I settled into a kitchen chair adjacent to it. I snatched yesterdays paper off the table and began to reread the front page articles but the words made no sense, the simply became lines and lines of nonsensical letters strewn together.

Inexplicable dread filled my heart, and I knew that beyond anything else, beyond the anger I felt for what Paul was putting me through, I was afraid for him. I didn't understand how he had managed to fuck himself over so thoroughly, or why he felt that these people were worth all the risk and trouble, but I knew in my heart that he had gotten in way over his head. Maybe he was shipping these people out to be rid of them after a debilitating lapse of judgment, His job was stressful to say the least and I could see the romance in befriending criminals who never harmed innocent people, but it was wrong and they were wanted, and Paul desperately needed my help, or maybe just some support.

I let the paper slip out of my hands and onto the table and I sat cradling my head. I couldn't believe I was actually doing this.

* * *

I changed my mind three times over the course of that mostly sleepless night, but by the time I was about ready to head off to work I forced myself to pick up my cell phone and punch in Paul's number. It rang twice.

"Hey" answered Paul with a strange somber note in his voice.

"Hey" I answered quite unenthusiastically.  
"I wanted to talk to you about everything, but I'm sure maybe we should do it in person." I said slowly, trying to keep my voice from quivering.

"Okay" he answered, I suspected a little more apolitically than he intended. "When"

"Lunch?" I suggested

"No, I've got a lot of work this afternoon. How about dinner?"

"Dinner is good for me."

* * *

Work was mind numbing but that really wasn't a development. Deb was even more talkative than usual blathering on about how much she can't stand to be single.

"I don't get it. Why can't I have a nice stable relationship like and you Will? Do I just attract weirdoes and assholes?" she sighed tossing her long hair from her shoulder. I was actually tempted to correct her about my relationship with Will, or lack thereof, but I fought it off. I knew I would have to come clean about it eventually; I had applied with my phone company to get my number changed a few days before and would have to update everyone I knew. I knew Deb would want to know why and I simply didn't have the stamina to keep up the lie up for much longer. I would tell her, but just not immediately, I already had too much on my mind and my emotions proved too volatile on the subject for me to trust that I wouldn't fall to pieces the second I dwelled on the subject long enough to tell Deb.

"Hang in there Deb." Was all I could say.

* * *

I came home that night to yet another feline escape attempt, but this one was foiled less violently allowing me to keep my feet and my silent household dignity. Paul called about an hour later claiming that he had picked up some greasy fast food and was driving as he spoke to collect me. At least I had time to change out of my stiff office cloths and into my favorite broken in jeans and a plain black long sleeve shirt. I threw on a heavy jacket and had just enough time to wash the formaldehyde smell off my hands when I saw his headlights move across my window. I ran across the apartment, stopped only once to lock my door, and bounded out.

I was shivering violently by the time I reached Paul's car. The cold air seemed to pierce through my jacket and I was all too happy to settle into the warm leather seat. I could make out Paul's uneasy smile in the blue gloom of the car and offered one of my own. The ride to Paul's apartment was a long and uncomfortable one. We tried our best to fill the empty void with small talk but it was a feeble attempt and I sensed that Paul was as exhausted as I was.

* * *

Paul swiped his access card and opened the front door, chivalrously holding it open for me as always. The warm light of the common room reflected off the polished marble floors. Paul took the lead and directed me toward the three large elevators at the far end of the room; he waved at the security guard who waved back and redirected his attention to the large leather bound book he had clenched in his wide hairy hands. We climbed into the far right elevator and I watched as the doors pushed the common room out of sight. Paul pressed the button for the fifth floor. My stomach hardly noticed the lurch of the moving elevator as it had felt similarly for the last two days. The cramped space of the elevator made me that much more uncomfortable.

We took two right turns down the long bland hallways and stopped at the apartment labeled 36. Paul isolated a large brass key off his bulging keychain that he produced from his pocket and opened the door. The smell of greasy fries and cigarette smoke greeted us as we made our way into the dining room. Paul's' apartment was large and was divided between a hallway that stretched its entire length. The doors on the right side lead to the dining room, which then lead to the kitchen, one of the two bathrooms. The doors to the left lead to the living room, two bedrooms and the smaller bathroom. His apartment was always kept unbelievably clean; I didn't understand where he found the time. He insisted that he didn't hire a maid making me suspect he suffered from some mild oppressive compulsive disorder.

Paul closed the door behind us as I stripped off my coat and let my eyes adjust to the soft lighting of the apartment. The walls were painted a rich yet soft tea color and the pristine dark hardwood floors were polished to an unsettling mirror like shine. Paul led the way once again turning into the first door on the right. The walls of the dining room were plain as well, but not uncomfortably. In any other house the lack of personal pictures or little useless knickknacks would be unsettling, but for some strange reason that I'm sure I will never quite work out, it seemed so fitting for Paul to decorate blandly and impersonally. Sometimes I liked to think that it was because he so seldom stayed in one location for long, I knew he owned a few apartments around the country, but I knew in my heart that wasn't the reason. Maybe he just didn't care.

Two brown paper bags sat neatly on plain white plates on the darkly lacquered table. Despite the artery clogging nature of the food I knew resided in those bags I simply didn't care. I was too hungry and sometimes there was nothing better than the pure apathy of gorging oneself on junk food, besides anything was better than slightly cold spaghetti o's swimming in a mystery sauce. Paul wrestled out of his jacket and snatched mine out of my arms, and striding out into the hallway again he told me over his shoulder "take a seat".

So I did, and did my best to not feel awkward. I jumped when the orchastatic overture of some obscure opera filled the room with soft music. I glanced panicked around me until I visually located the small surround speakers that dotted the walls. This was going to be harsh and I felt my hands begin to shake. Paul strode in a few moments later and painted a weak smile on his lips. It faded faster than I thought he meant it to. He settled into the chair next to me. I could feel his body heat on my shoulder and tried to calm my nerves and keep my stomach from turning. Despite my increasing nausea I opened the bag and fumbled blindly into it. Paul didn't move, I could feel his eyes on me and I suddenly felt flushed and inexplicably embarrassed. My rummaging slowed to a stop and I forced myself to turn my head and meet his unwavering gaze.

Something in his eyes made my insides turn cold.

"I'm sorry about all of this." He blurted in a tone more serious than any I had ever heard him use. He opened his mouth but closed it almost immediately and redirected his attention to the interior of his own plain paper bag. I was speechless, what could I say. I thought I was furious with him but when he looked at me like that, with that hopeless expression on his face. I could see the dark circles lining his eyes and the wrinkles forming on his forehead. I suspected then that he did indeed realize what he was asking of me, he was asking me to risk everything, my job, my freedom, and these people were killers, maybe even my life. Oh god, what had he gotten himself into.

I knew I had to say something, but nothing appropriate sprang to mind. You couldn't really talk about the weather or daytime television when something like this was in the back of our minds. Paul began to munch of French fries quite unenthusiastically. I said the first thing that sprang to mind

"How…did this happen?" admittedly not the most delicate way to initiate the topic.

He swallowed his mouthful of oily fries and looked at me with that same cold gaze. I met his gaze meekly and it took all of my concentration to hold it. I deserved to know and was determined to have an answer. He took a long moment to compose himself.

"I never planned for you know; I didn't want it to hurt you."

I didn't know what he meant by that, was he concerned for my physical well being, or did he really have a grasp of how disturbing it was to me that he had done something like this.

"I appreciate it, but that hardly matters now." I said.

I saw Paul stiffen in the corner of my eye and suppressed the urge to grimace. That came out sharper and more cynical than I had designed it.

I sighed; there was no getting around it. I was growing increasingly impatient with this conversation and I could feel my face growing hot with sleep deprived aggravation.

"Is it over after they leave? When they go, it's done right?" I said rubbing my eyes with the flats of my palms. I could feel the dull ache behind my them.

Paul didn't say anything; he simply pursed his lips and numbly nodded his head.

"Fine." I said flatly. He looked up then, the expression on his face seemed more jubilant than I thought necessary. He must have seen the slightly repulsed emotion that sprung to my face at the slightly inappropriate expression on his because he harnessed it and it faded to a knowing smirk. He reached his large hand out to muss my hair but I dodged it.

* * *

As I had suspected, time was the biggest factor. David's corpse was scheduled to be shipped down to New York on Friday for his funeral and burial on Sunday, and although I could make up some hasty lie about late test results or legal compilations that required more paperwork and forethought than I was willing to give. I wanted this to be over as soon and as painlessly as possible. I wasn't exactly happy with myself for caving, and I was defiantly not happy with Paul. But I had no time to dwell on that.

I had no illusions that this was going to be easy. Not only did I have to get rid of Deb for the night I had to make sure that some police officer or EMS paramedic didn't stumble on our little operation. On expressing this concern to Paul he reassured me that he would station officers at all of the entrances but that did little to squander my fears, I knew the incompetency of the Boston Police all too well.

Thursday was the day, it was the only day. I told Deb I was staying late, that I had gotten behind in paperwork.

"I can help! I've got nothing to do." She offered sweetly. Her voice echoed off the stainless steel walls of the examining room.

"No that's okay, it's my fault for getting behind anyway, and I won't torture you."

"Okay…" She sighed dramatically. "Since you're staying anyway, would you take some pulmonary slides and send them to lab for me. I might dodge out a little early tonight. You enjoy that paperwork though." She said with a sly smile.

"Sure, and I hate you." I said. I felt a warm flicker of friendliness blossom inside me despite everything.

I didn't eat lunch, my stomach kept somersaulting and even the thought of food made my hands feel weak. I fained being desperately preoccupied with paperwork until Deb finally took off.

"Are you sure you're okay? You know, alone?" Deb asked as she leaned on the bland metal doorframe.

"I'm good Deb" I answered glancing up. She straightened herself and put her small hands on her tiny waist.

"You're strange." She stated quite nonchalantly.

"So you keep reminding me." I said with an artificial sneer.

"Well don't be here all night. I know how you are." She commanded as she turned on her heal and strode out. I heard the heavy front door close behind her and for once it was upsetting to be alone. Paul would arrive in the early hours of the morning though he failed to specify exactly when, I suspected even he didn't know for sure, so until then I had to entertain myself and try not to have a panic attack.

I resorted to mindless internet searching. My mother had sent me a long e-mail, reaffirming that she supported my choice to leave William although I sensed that she secretly wished I had chosen to stick his infidelity out. I think she mourned the loss of my impending marriage than the loss of William; maybe she even resented the schism that it had driven between my family. I attempted to write her back but everything I put down seemed distant and awkward. I became frustrated after a time and gave up.

I busied myself for a while meticulously preparing the pulmonary slides of Jenifer Scott, a women of a mere 63 years of age who was found on the floor of her kitchen, she had spiral fractured her right femur and although she was discovered before she had succumbed to her injuries she died of a subsequent pneumonia in the hospital three days later. In most similar instances the pneumonia would usually be the result of days spent sprawled injured and in a prone position, but due to the obviously severely advanced state of the pneumonia she may have had it for quite some time before her fall. To give her an accurate cause of death several small sections of the lung and fluid inside the lung would have to be sent away for analysis.

It was an effective distraction, but a short lived one. I found myself in the same state of restless anticipation, with stomach lurching and hands sweating. I had hardly slept the night before, and the back of my head ached dully but painfully with every movement I made. It soon dizzied me and I found myself resting my poor aching head on a makeshift pillow comprised of my coat atop of my cold desk. I closed my eyes and surprisingly must have dozed off because I woke with a start as my cell phone rang shrilly inside the same desk. My heart fluttered with fright as I tried to remember where I was in the oppressive dark that had claimed my office. The sky had darkened from dieing blue to ink black, and clear shimmering stars shone from behind the thin tangled tree limbs encroaching the view out of my large, slightly dusty window. The realization slammed into me as the second ring echoed off the wall and made me flinch. I groped the desk drawer and managed to slam my hand painfully against the handle. I threw it open nosily, grabbed my ancient purse trying to ignore the dull throbbing of my hand as I unzipped it. I groped franticly in the jumbled contentces of it swearing all the while, I located it finally and flipped it open on the fourth ring. The room illuminated for a split second by its luminous blue glow, I didn't even think to check if it was truly Paul's number, I was so flustered I simply answered it.

"Hello?" I ventured weakly, my voice sounded tired and nervous even to myself.

"We're outside." Paul said briskly and much calmer than I could have believed.

"Oh, I'll be right there." I answered, my stomach flopping violently.

"The back door." He corrected.

"Right" I tried to sound braver and more composed but it came out to forced and completely unconvincing.

I flipped the phone closed before I could embarrass myself further. I stood and let my purse fall to the desk and threw my phone back inside it. I strode carefully to the door, my legs felt weak with what I tried to tell myself was weariness but I knew it was induced by the fear that seemed to have hijacked my mind. I found the light switch and flipped it. The industrial lights above flickered weakly at first, lighting the room in small and disorienting flashes before buzzing to life. My head throbbed with pain as the bright lighting seemed to fan my migraine back to life. I checked the clock that hung near the door, it was one twenty five in the morning, far earlier than I had expected. I strode down the dark hall, my shadow gliding silently on the waxed floor before me. I found the main office in a similar state of absolute blackness, save the small sliver of light that carried down the hall. I found the light switches after only a moment of frantic wall groping.

I jogged past the examining room to the back double door and snatched the key that hung from my neck along with my identification badge with possibly the most unflattering picture I had ever taken on it. I snatched the entire cord from my neck, twisting it around my head I felt it gently pull my hair from my shoulders. I concentrated on steadying my hands, but my fingers felt numb and thick and clumsy, and I shocked myself when the door unlocked with little struggle. I realized I was almost panting, so I took a brief moment to compose myself before easing the door open.

Paul stood about three feet from the door, savoring the last few drags of his almost spent cigarette. The previously idle smoke floating lazily in the air wafted into the examining room and burned the back of my throat. He flicked its glowing nub away and shot me a warm smile.

Motion drew my eye behind his shoulder, as a tall figure that had been leaning on the dirty and spider web strew brick wall straightened himself. He stepped gingerly behind Paul as a second figure emerged from behind the same wall, flicking away his own cigarette. His was only half spent, and it hit the adjacent ramp in a spray of amber sparks. His boots flopped noisily up the three concrete steps. An embarrassing jolt of panic shot through me and my feet seemed to root in place. Paul slowly started for the door, forcing me to step slowly back inside. The two men followed closely behind, but not before they shared a slight and silent look.

Paul's polished shoes clicked slightly on the cold, polished floor, where as the strangers boots squealed noisily as they crossed the threshold awkwardly.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

My mother made me take French when I was a child. The romance wore off faster than I could have believed. I found I had no skill with languages to the dismay of my mother who strived tooth and nail to raise a cultured child. What she got was a morbid child, a quite child who read more than she spoke. I suppose learning French was negated by my lack of social ability to flaunt it. Parents are inherently selfish in some ways, I never really understood it.

* * *

I washed down the stainless steel gurney with the antibacterial toilettes that I never keep far from me. Paul paced restlessly the heels of his shoes echoing irritatingly off the bland walls. I could hear the men's hushed voices float in. It took me a few moments of puzzled eavesdropping to realize they were speaking another language. At first I suspected that I had suffered from some kind of mind altering stroke as the fact that two blatantly Irish men fluently speaking something that wasn't garbled English or archaic Gallic simply blew my mind.

"What is that?" I asked Paul, who halted his pacing, listened to the hushed voices, and answered.

"Italian, I think."

"I thought so, but I wasn't sure." I said, noting the unintentional feebleness in my voice with a grimace. The flimsy attempt at normal conversation was suffocated easily by the awkwardness of the situation, and I felt my face grow inexplicably warm at the thought of our stiff introductions.

* * *

I closed the door behind them, and caught a glimpse of a black car with heavily tinted windows parked at the curb. Its driver's side window was cracked and the acidic reek of cigar smoke met my nose even at that distance. These would, of course be the police officers Paul had promised me would keep this meeting a private and invisible one. I was troubled as I locked the door firmly, the sound of the heavy mechanical inner workings echoed off the walls and down the empty hallways, if I could spot the police parked so suspiciously than anyone could. I turned to them and slipped my identification badge back around my neck.

"Lidia, this is Connor, "Paul gestured to the man closest to him. The man stiffened immediately, and didn't meet my gaze; he was instead engrossed with glaring at Paul with confusion. I realized then that Paul had used his real name, something the man and even I wasn't expecting. Paul glanced back at him, raising an eyebrow to urge the man on. Connor must have suddenly realized that I was still standing in front of him as he snapped his head back and smiled awkwardly, raising his hand for me to shake. His hand were cold, the skin tight and dry with the night chill. His face was long and symmetrical but he seemed distant and weary. His polite smile faded and a solemn mask replaced it. His forehead was high, as were his cheeks. His eyes were thoughtful and contemplative.

"Nice ta meet you" he mumbled solemnly. He tried to smother his Irish accent but it bled through all the same. That was probably one of Paul's ideas, as they weren't exactly as cautious during the whole Yakavetta operation.

I didn't answer him; I simply nodded my head and smiled. As he drew his hand back to plunge it into his jean pocket I saw a flash of tattoo that crawled from the meat of his hand up his index finger, but I couldn't make sense of it. I redirected my attention, fearful of the discovery of my impolite gaze and the further awkwardness it would inflict.

"And this is Murphy." Paul continued, gesturing to the second man who took my hand in his own with less delay. His grip was equally stiff and cold, but he smiled in the same warm manner as his counterpart. His eyes held an eerily similar cold pensiveness, his face was squarer, his jaw line more pronounced.

A wave of silence hit us then, Paul plunged his fists into his pants pockets and I tried to subdue a growing sense of panic. They didn't look like killers; they were too young, barley into their mid twenties, and too docile. They didn't sneer, or look me up and down. They looked too normal.

"I'm sorry for your loss." I offered weakly which earned stiff nods from both of the men.

I backed away slowly and turned on my heal. I could hear Paul's footfalls behind me.

I was grateful for the company, it made me feel less insane and besides, I needed help transporting the body from the refrigerator to the gurney. It really isn't that hard, the cold steel slab David's corpse rested on had several inner wheels that allowed it to slide in and out of the refrigerator easily. Once the slab began to roll it was simply a matter of positioning the gurney correctly.

Paul stripped his coat from his shoulders and flung it atop a derelict desk crammed behind the door. He held the gurney stiffly until the corpse has slid into place. I nodded my thanks.

The two men looked up unsettlingly simultaneously. They glanced at each other with a knowing sadness, and turned to face the gurney as I pushed it noisily into place at the very center of the room. I pulled back the rubber sheet to reveal David's face, only then did the two strangers move forward, solemnly shuffling their booted feet toward the corpse. I pulled the sheet down only enough to uncover his face and the top half of his torso that remained unmarred by the gun blast that had torn into it so savagely. The Y incision was admittedly unsightly, the stitching thick and raised almost half an inch above the skin. It was beyond me why the court had insisted on the autopsy, the cause of death was obviously the sever internal trauma sustained by the gun blast. Although the autopsy itself was unnecessary, it did give me the chance to understand how internally devastating such a wound could be. The bullet's sheer force had shattered David's sternum causing fractured pieces of bone to lacerate the heart and both of his lungs. His lungs had begun to fill with blood, but the trauma to his heart was so severe that he died before he could drown agonizingly on his own blood. His missing fingers were an added touch, two pinkies had been completely blown off, although one had time to clot and heal, third degree burns on the finger suggested that it had be poorly cauterized, the other had been inflicted much more recently.

The rubber sheet had mussed the dead man's long stringy hair; it fell in dull strands across his cold face. I swept them gingerly back into place, earning me a strange quick glance from Connor, instantly embarrassing me. I imagined that the motion seemed almost loving but it certainly wasn't intended to be. It was a reflex. The strangers beheld David's corpse with in silent sorrow, brows furrowed and lips pursed tightly.

He did not smell, and that was a relief. Unlike several of the other corpses found at the Yakavetta home David had been recovered almost immediately following his murder. The dry coldness of the refrigerator had taken its toll on the body, tightening the skin so severely that unsightly wrinkles began to form around his eyes and his bluish violet lips were beginning to curl upwards in a slight grim faux smile. Paul placed a large warm hand on my shoulder signifying that a graceful departure from the room in order to give the men some time alone with their departed friend was not uncalled for. I stepped away slowly, smiling my own faux apologetic smile, and followed Paul out.

The men's stiffness seemed to ease visibly upon our departure. They spoke softly to themselves, their murmurs floated into the open door. I realized suddenly how tired I really was as I felt myself sway on my aching feet.

"Why don't you sit?" Paul offered, gesturing at the vacant chair to his left that belonged to the derelict desk crammed behind the heavy door. Piles of old paperwork littered that desk, nothing critical mostly follow ups on tedious toxicology reports. I mindlessly rifled through them as I sat. The chair was hideously old and groaned noisily as I sat making me instantly tense awaiting a sudden and crushingly embarrassing collapse.

Paul leaned lazily against the pale wall, his elbow nudging the doorframe whose paint was beginning to peal. Paul rubbed at his forehead; this whole mess had taken its toll on him as well. He was worn-down, his resolve threadbare with angst and exhaustion. I felt instantly selfish, this hadn't really been all that taxing, all it meant for me was a few sleepless nights and a few extra hours spent farting around work. I suspected that in less than an hour this would all be over for me, and tomorrow I would wake up and it would be done. For Paul it was nowhere near over. He still had to find a way to smuggle two of the most wanted criminals out of the country as quickly and quietly as possible.

It was a full hour and a half before the men had sufficiently paid their respects and shuffled disturbing our artificial chatter. I walked them to the door in absolute silence. The world had grown frigidly cold outside, shivering I shook the men's hands, although they seemed to glance behind me more than once no doubt at the corpse of their late friend. They stated their thanks with glassy eyes and brittle voices. Paul shrugged on his coat and patted my shoulder before ushering the men out the door and into the black car still belching cigar smoke.

David's hand rested perfectly flat on his abdomen, the nails gleaming blue and the cuticles an unsightly purple. The wooden beads the delicate rosary that had been wrapped around his cold wrist clanked against each other as I gingerly tucked his hand back under the sheet. Devout Catholicism seemed an unlikely religious denomination for mass murderers I noted as I kicked the gurney brakes up.

* * *

I'd like to say that things went back to normal, but the truth was that the danger Paul had put himself into was never far from my mind. We would meet for occasional lunches and dinners and I would nudge bits and pieces of the story out of him. He acted like my questioning annoyed him, but I suspected that it was a bit relieving to have it all out. It made for a compelling story and was almost laughably serendipitous. It seemed to me that despite all of Paul's blathering about otherworldly feelings and inexplicable signs from god his lapse in judgment had been induced by a growing sense of dissatisfaction with his occupation and self doubt steaming from that. I kept it to myself, nodding my head and pretending to understand how he could continue to convince himself that what he was doing was called for. He confided in me the trouble he was having extraditing the fugitives out of the country. It was proving more difficult than he had imagined and he was becoming increasingly frustrated, and honestly so was I. The longer these men stayed in the country the more likely their being successfully perused and prosecuted became and that put not only Paul in danger but according to him a fair number of Boston Police investigators by association.

It was simply shocking to me that these two men had honestly seduced not only Paul, but half of the South Boston police force into believing in their warped cause so wholeheartedly that they would put their occupations, their lives and the lives of their loved ones in serious peril. I had to admit that the idea of annihilating people like Yakavetta for society's safety and benefit seemed strangely agreeable, and I knew that the legal system was far from infallible, but one could not simply wake up one day and decide to murder people, even if they were bad people.

This point seemed to escape Paul; I suspected that he had smothered it under layers of jargon about feelings and god and the good of human kind. Why was it so clear to me that these men were not otherworldly, and yet to Paul they were the Saints? To me they were nothing but the same kind of common criminal that gets dissected in my examining room every other week, and yet to him and half of the city they were saviors and defenders of the innocent.

* * *

I told Deb about William two weeks after my encounter with the Saints of South Boston. As predicted she unleashed an ungodly amount of "OH MY GODS!" and angry explicative's as I reiterated the story. I kept myself together, stating my suspicions with cold indifference as she paced angrily around the office.

"What the hell is wrong with your family? No offence." She blurted.  
"I mean, she's your cousin. That's sincerely fucked up."

"Yeah, I know." I answered stiffly.

"How are you so okay about this, I would be going on a killing spree right about now!"

"I don't know, things hadn't been great even before all of this. And I always knew Christina was a disgusting whore. I'm not saying it wasn't hard at first, it was. I guess at this point I'm just glad that I found out who he really is before I did something stupid like marry the asshole." I gave my best fake smile.

"So, what did you do with the ring?" She asked gesturing at my naked finger.

"Nothing, its sitting on my dresser collecting dust and cat hair."

An evil sneer crept across Deb's face, almost frightening in its Grinch like resemblance.

"Let's pawn it." She said, extenuating every syllable with wicked delight.

My first reaction was a visceral no, and I began to form the words with my mouth when the beautiful simplicity of the deed sunk in.

Deb pounced, taking advantage of my hesitation, grabbing my hand and pulling me toward the door. I put up token resistance, before succumbing.

* * *

I ran into my apartment, slamming the door right as the cat began to bond down the hall. I sprinted into my room, leaping over my dirty cloths hamper and snatched the ring off the dresser. The white gold of the band was cold in my hands and it gleamed in the sunlight that streamed in between the blinds. The single large diamond glittered in the golden light, as did the six diamond chips that were inlaid in the band, three to either side of the center stone. The ring would fetch a pretty penny, and I almost felt bad as I opened the passenger side door of Debs car. The ring was Williams Grandmothers after all.

I tried not to grin as the jeweler counted out three thousand four hundred dollars.

Deb and I ordered an early dinner from my favorite Italian restaurant, complete with a bottle of wine. We completely abandoned our work and I didn't really care, I knew I would be playing catch up for the rest of the week but for the first time in a long time I felt almost myself again. We laughed like old friends.

"Why don't you go home, relax a little bit." Deb offered smiling. I accepted, feeling lighthearted for once. We chatted idly as she walked me to the door.

"I feel bad leaving you here." I said, trying to make it sound convincing as I searched my purse for my keys.

"I've got work to do, I can handle it"

Suddenly her face grew inexplicably serious.

"Hey, this will work out. " She encouraged me solemnly. She hugged me unexpectedly, but I was surprisingly glad she did. The warmth of her arms around me was comforting, and didn't feel forced or dutiful. My throat grew tight and I felt suddenly ridiculous for feeling so emotional over such a slight affection.

"Everything happens for a reason." She said smiling sadly. Those words hung in my head as I drove home, the sun casting purple stripes across the sky as it set.

That was the last time I saw Deborah, those were the last words she said to me.

* * *

dragonzfire718- Thanks! ;) Sorry that it takes me so long to update, I am usualy working on chapters every free second that I have!

Yodalovr- Sorry about the grammar stuff, I have always had a problem with it. sigh  
One of these days I plan on going through and fixing all the mistakes, so it will probably take me a while. Bear with me!  
Thanks for the encouragement, its sourly needed. Back at you with the force stuff.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

I sincerely intended to stop by the bank before I went home, but by the time I left work it was already 5:45, which meant that if I sped and somehow managed to remain unhindered by treacherous red lights I would just be able to make it before the bank closed. Plus the harpies that worked there would give me the stink eye when I walked in; annoyed that I would have the audacity to make them stay for a whole three more minutes.

The cat was caught unawares when I walked in, napping on the kitchen windowsill. I was able to close the door quietly for once. I knew that my free evening would be better spent relaxing, but the pile of rancid dishes and heap of laundry growing larger and smellier by the day demanded to be attended to. I dumped my purse on the table, riffled my bulging wallet out of it and strode into the bedroom. I kicked my shoes off at the foot of my unmade bed and closed the half open blinds. The stripes of golden sun they painted on the cream colored carpet faded into blackness.

I wrestled the mound of twenty and one hundred dollar bills from my wallet and tossed them on the bed. I dug my small fireproof briefcase out from the pile of neglected shoes in my closet and unlocked it with the small silver key I kept in my dresser drawer. I kept my important documents in the small briefcase, things I couldn't afford to be burned or stolen. I threw the money in a yellowed envelope that already contained close to eight hundred dollars. In the morning I would dig the briefcase out again and make a trip to the bank, leaving only the initial eight hundred for some kind of emergency.

I threw on my pajama bottoms and a t-shirt and put the laundry in the decrepit machine, then got to work on the dishes. My feet were aching by the time I finished and flopped onto my couch. Mindless television time should have eased my mind, but this crushing sadness seemed to seep into me and I found my face was warm and wet with bitter tears. The stress was starting to eat away at me, and something about being rid of the engagement ring was freeing, but somehow horrible as well. It made things real and, suddenly, I saw the state that my life had been left in.

When I moved to Boston I left everything I knew, my family, friends, and the one person I thought I would build the rest of my life around. But as the months crawled by, the years seemed to separate us. It was like the home and life I left in Pennsylvania was a universe away and I found that our relationship had been starved and emaciated until we were shadows of ourselves, and our love was being flimsily held together by ritual rather than genuine feeling.

Nothing had gone to plan. A crazed thought popped into my head, a vision of me packing everything I owned into my car and gunning it back home. I could be almost there by the time the sun rose. It shook from my head rather easily, it's implausible nature made it effortless to dismiss. I couldn't leave this place, it was the home I had scraped together from nothing, and somehow I had muscled past all the things about living in a city that revolted and scared me. I hated it at first, I despised everything about it. The noise, the smell, the weather, but I knew that if I tucked tail and fled back home I was being weak and I had to prove to myself that I was stronger than that.

I shuffled to the bathroom and attempted to wash my face, the coolness of the water calming me slightly. I was not a stranger to these bouts of crying. They began with my father's diagnosis but by the time he died I had learned to use them to my advantage an instrument of anxiety release. I knew that in the morning I would wake up and I would feel infinitely better about everything. I also knew that I would honestly have to start sorting myself out. So I let the tears run their course, welling in my eyes and slipping down my cheeks, drenching my chest and shirt.

My eyes were throbbing as I curled up under my covers, but sleep claimed me within a matter of minutes. I slept the dark, dreamless sleep of the exhausted and woke not to the tuneless chiming of my alarm clock but with a mouthful of soft cat fur. I swatted the animal away, abruptly stopping her uncharacteristically frantic rubbing. I propped myself on my elbow and grouped the bedside lamp but my fingers felt thick and clumsy with sleep. Defeated, I rose to my feet and carefully stumbled into the hall. The knocking echoed down the hall, freezing my zombie walk instantaneously. I thought I had imagined it so I stood in absolute silence, swaying slightly on my weary uncoordinated feet. I wrapped my hand around the open door frame of the kitchen and leaned into it, straining my eyes into the darkness. 3:02 glared back at me on the neon green oven clock.

I was almost convinced that the sound had been an invention of my barely conscious mind when the knocking resumed, five loud slow knocks that made my stomach summersault and sobered my drowsy mind. I rushed to the door and peered out into the hall.

The light was irritatingly bright in the corridor awaking a dull throbbing ache behind my eyes. I caught Paul checking his watch with irritation and pursing his lips. The grave expression on his face sent a rush of panicked blood to my head, increasing the tempo and severity of the agonizing throbbing, and I almost swung the door open that instant, desperate to know what had given Paul cause to wake me at three in the morning when another figure stepped into view. A young man who stood a good two feet shorter than Paul. His cloths were casual but stylish, a pair of fitted dark blue jeans, black shirt under a black jacket. His skin was dark olive and flawless and his black hair was trimmed neatly. His strong jaw was cleanly shaven and his eyes, although slightly too far apart, were infinitely brighter and more alert than Paul's. An identification badge dangled from his neck, and my stomach plummeted. I instantly feared the worst.

I leaned away from the door and took a second to collect myself; two deep breaths were all I was allowed though as Paul resumed beating on the door. Flustered I unlocked it, and swung it open.

Paul looked at me through weary and stern eyes, the other man straightened himself and his expression was business like. He opened his mouth to introduce himself but I cut him off.

"Paul?" I asked my voice husky with sleep. "What's wrong?"

A look of absolute relief washed over Paul's face, only to be replaced with a grievous expression that made me feel nauseous.

"Miss Davis, My name is James Clarkson, I'm with the FBI." The stranger stated coolly snatching the identification badge from his neck and flashing it by me.

"What's going on?" I demanded, uninterested with who this person was, darting my gaze between him and Paul.

"May we come in?" The stranger asked cordially.

I was growing more frustrated by the minute. If something had happened I wanted to know what and I wanted to know now, but I knew giving this man attitude was a bad idea so I stepped aside and allowed them to step in. I closed and locked the door behind them, trying to calm myself.

I led the way into the kitchen, brushing past the two men standing awkwardly in my hall. I flip the light switch as I strode in. I was tempted to offer the men coffee but I suspected that it would further delay the conversation. My head was spinning as I offered the men seats at my cluttered kitchen table. James nodded his thanks politely and quietly pulled out a chair, Paul took his seat in intimidating silence. I settled into my chair directly across from them, my heart hammering.

"Miss Davis, what time did you leave work tonight?" Asked James coldly as he folded his muscular arms around his chest and settled back into his chair. His face betrayed nothing but cool concentration.

My mind surged with fear and confusion.

"At 6:00, I think. Look, what is this about?"

The stranger glanced at Paul, but Paul reluctantly stepped in.

"At approximately 1:00 this morning, as Deb was leaving the morgue and walking to her car, she was assaulted. We don't know who attacked her, but we have some ideas." Paul explained unemotionally. His callous tone and distant behavior was alarming me.

"Do you remember anything unusual? Anyone lurking around, unfamiliar vehicles?" Asked James boring inquisitively into me with dark eyes.

"No! What's going on?!" Anger and fear tore through my resolve.

* * *

I sat in my pajamas, huddled under Paul's jacket watching trauma nurses buzz around the hall. Disbelief washed over me as I trembled with anxious anticipation.

I could hear Paul and James murmur to each other down the hall, huddled next to the vending machines, cups of coffee steaming in their hands. I could see Paul glance at me from the corner of my eye but I started ahead.

I sat in that hall for an eternity, staring into the wall and wondering how the fuck did this happen. The doctor startled me when he stopped in front of me. I rose to my feet dazed, and shook his hand numbly. We exchanged pleasantries and he commenced explaining Deb's condition. I don't remember his face, or the faux look of sympathy he painted on it.

"Deborah has sustained some very serious injuries. She was shot three times, in the chest, lower side, and she was grazed by a bullet that destroyed the majority of her right ear. The chest wound is the most severe, she has a collapsed lung. We don't know how long she lay unfound, but by the time the ambulance reached her she was going into shock due to the amount of blood loss." He paused then, giving the words time to sink in.

"Because of the blood loss, her brain was starved of oxygen. She has gone into a comatose state and as of now is unresponsive."

The words washed over me but I couldn't understand them.

* * *

I sat dazed next to Deborah in the dark solitary ICU room. That was another bad sign; they only put people in Deb's condition in solitary rooms when the end was foreseeable. Nobody wanted wailing friends and family congesting the halls. My friend was dead already; she was a warm, breathing corpse. Cognitively unresponsive was the sugar coated medical lingo for brain dead. Paul left me alone, and for that I was thankful. He had business anyway, I saw him dash by the window periodically, questioning doctors and nurses, speaking hurriedly to the several officers loitering in the halls.

The darkness of the room painted a blue tint to Debs skin, she seemed luminous despite everything. The respirator concealed most of her mouth, and I tried to ignore the bag of bloody urine dangling from the end of the bed. The right side of her face was bruised and inflamed, her right eye swollen completely shut. Dark ringlets of hair stuck to her face with dried blood and sweat.

The nurse would be in soon I knew, to check her vitals and change the dressings on her ear as she had almost completely bled through them. Besides, her family would walk in any moment, and that would be too much for me to bear. I had to keep myself numb, if I broke down now there would be no recovering, and I had too much to do. I leant over Deb and kissed her cheek. The smell of her shampoo mixed with the coppery scent of blood almost undid me. I dug my nails into my palm, straightened myself, and strode out of her room. I meant to walk right out of the hospital, get into a cab and to the airport, but Paul was leaning on the wall opposite the door. His presence made me jump, my already hammering heart thudding louder in my ears.

"Where do you think you're going?" He asked quietly, pushing himself off the wall with a lurch of his back.

"Away." I snarled.

"Sorry kiddo, can't let that happen."

I wanted to scream. I wanted to beat his head into the wall and let the angry tears gush down my face. I hated him in that moment.

He wrapped his arm around my shoulders, I tried to wriggle out of his grip but he held me painfully tight and began to walk me down the hall. I stiffened my feet, struggling against him. People were beginning to look. He awkwardly changed his grip on me, wrapping his arm under his borrowed jacket that dwarfed me and around my waist.

He was pulled me so hard my feet were lifting off the ground. We turned a corner into an empty hallway and Paul dodged us into a storage room, shoving me in first so he could keep the door to his back and me away from it. Pitch black darkness engulfed us and it took a few seconds for Paul to find the light switch. When he did the industrial lights flickered and buzzed to life illuminating the room that was little bigger than a closet crammed with boxes of gauze strips and latex gloves. A locked cabinet that was packed full of new hypodermic needles.

I opened my mouth to scream at him, to demand what the hell he thought he was doing, but he was quicker.

"Now you listen to me!" He growled stepping toward me furiously. He had never raised his voice to me and it was alarming, chasing my argument down my throat.

"You can hate me, I don't care, you can hate me for the rest of your life, but this cluster-fuck is one tiny little fuck up away from a disaster." He barked.

"This isn't exactly what I would classify as a Cluster-fuck." I explained slowly, trying and failing to keep my temper in check.

"This is fucking murder!"

"Yes, and I will deal with it accordingly, trust me. But right now we have a few more pressing issues."

I rolled my eyes. I had no time for this.

"Like what!"

"Like the men sitting in a black van in the parking lot waiting for us, or more specifically, waiting for you." Paul was almost screaming. Sweat was beading on his forehead. I was afraid, or hoping, that someone would hear our little interaction and barge in, giving me the chance to bolt out.

Paul rubbed at his forehead with long trembling fingers and took a deep breath. A somber look seeped into his features.

"It would seem that we were followed despite our precautions. Yakavetta's brother has apparently taken up the family business, and decided to do a little investigation of his own." He said solemnly.

"They are going to come after you with everything they have; they know that you are their best bet of finding the Saints. If they find you they aren't going to end it quick, they way they did for Deborah."

I had known it somehow, when they told me Deb had been shot I knew that it wasn't some random mugging. Fear gripped my stomach, almost completely smothering my anger. I shivered under Paul's starchy jacket.

"What are we going to do?" I asked, trying not to notice the slight, sad smirk that snuck across Paul's face at my defeated tone. He put his hands on my shoulders, making me stare at him square in the face.

"I'm going to get you out of this." He said and I could see the fear and doubt in his eyes even as his tone betrayed none of it. More than anything in the world I wished that I could have believed him.

Dragonzfire718- Who doesn't love cliffhangers! I didn't intended to end the chapter that way but I thought, what the hell, lets mess with them a little.

Nyah1- Thanks! Poor Deb has been disposed of for our amusement, because I'm evil! )

Special thanks to Vodalovr for proofreading this!


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

"I want my PJ's back." I protested as I climbed into the back of the ambulance.

"You'll have you precious pajama's back, I swear. Now strap yourself in and shut up." Paul demanded, slamming the back doors. The automatic locking mechanisms fasten them securely shut. I lowered the swiveling seat down and planted my ass on it. Paul Climbed into the passenger seat and the driver started the engine which rumbled and vibrated the entire back cabin. I fiddled with the heater dials on the ceiling and braved the cold air they blew in anticipation of the hot air it preceded.

The forest green scrubs they gave me were scratchy and ill fitting. Paul made me hand my pajama bottoms to an LPN of my height and size. She was led out the front doors and into James's sleek black car under the watchful gaze of my would be abductors. Only when they had taken the bait did Paul lead me outside to cram me into the back of an unoccupied ambulance. An unmarked car packed with federal agents and well armed police officers would follow us as an extra security measure.

We pulled away from the hospital and I was more than happy to leave the sterile smell and curious gazes behind. The dark interior of the ambulance was an intimidating place, with tubes and wires coiled neatly like snakes only illuminated in flashes by the passing streetlamps. I soon lost track of where we were, and defeated I closed my eyes and tried to let the rhythmic swaying of the ambulance to lull me into a light sleep but every time I shut my eyes I could only see Deb's face, hideously distorted with immature bruises, her ear oozing half coagulated blood through its dressings. I retracted into myself with despair, I felt my soul grow quite.

By the time we slowed to a stop I was feeling sick.

The driver let the engine idle as Paul unhinged his seat belt and slid out of the passenger side. I unfasten my own harness with thick numb fingers and rose to my feet, careful not to smack my head on the low ceiling. Paul waited for the headlights of the following car to come into view before he opened the door. I clumsily fumbled out of the back, leaning on Paul's broad shoulder as I jumped down. The unassuming car pulled past the ambulance and parked, four armed men filing out of it. Paul left my side to mumble with them and I was beyond caring.

I concentrated on trying to keep myself warm, hugging my arms around my quivering body. My stomach was starting to knot in painful cramps and I thought for a split second that I was going to vomit all over the new pavement of the bus garage. It was an ideal place to change vehicles I realized as I glanced about, desperately trying to sooth my churning insides. There was only one entrance, a narrow road about 50 yards long. The road was lined with thick old trees sheltering us from the glare of the surrounding apartment buildings convenience stores and gas stations and we were far enough from the road to worry about being spotted. The garage itself was large with tin walls painted a neutral green. Moths audibly thrashed against the single external light that hung above the automated garage doors.

I sat on the bumper of the ambulance, feeling the cold seep through the scrubs and up my legs. Paul found me there huddled in the dark watching the stiff cold breeze stir the mostly barren branches.

"Come on, let's go." He said starkly.

I rose stiffly; my thighs almost completely numb with cold and followed him toward the idling car. The agents walked past me, giving me sad smiles as they filed into the ambulance. Their faces bled together. I tried to smile back but the gesture expired on my face, I resolved to watch my feet pull me closer to the car. I crawled into the passenger seat reveling in the wonder of its warmth. Paul waited for the ambulance to pull out and for the world to grow still again before he put the car in gear.

"Where are we going?" I asked watching the trees trunks fly past us.

"It's not safe for you back at the apartment" he answered simply

"Yours or mine?" I asked.

"Either."

"So what, we get a hotel?"

"No, too dangerous."

I knew where we were, but I didn't let on. This was a bad neighborhood, the apartments cramped and crammed with delinquents. The house we pulled up to looked derelict. It was large with two levels and a crumbling foundation. The roof was gilded with nearly rusted through tin that painted brown-red streaks across the pealing white paint of the walls. The house had its own overgrown front lawn and was settled far from the road. With no immediate neighbors it seemed a perfect spot for a meth-lab but the windows were black and not a sound could be heard from within.

"_This_ is safer than a hotel?" I asked gurglingly.

"Infinitely." Paul answered turning off the headlights and costing into the driveway. Surprisingly he pulled off the crumbling concrete and into the browning grass of the back yard where the car could not be seen from the road. Weeds and sapling arms scraped against the doors. They grabbed at my scrubs and bit at my legs as we made our way toward the house. The back door was as unfriendly as the rest of the house, painted a faded grey with a tarnished knob. It had no window to speak of. Paul strode toward it confidently, I shrunk behind him wringing my hands.

Paul knocked on it, three sharp raps. A few uneasy seconds ticked by before the door opened just a crack. My heart leaped in my chest when I realized that not a sliver of light peeked out of that crack. Suddenly my mind was full of the juvenile ghost stories I loved so much as a child. A white face peeked through the crack. I strained my eyes in the dark. The face belonged to an older man. His grey hair and beard seemed almost white in the early morning gloom. Paul smiled broadly at him and the man returned a smaller one. He glanced at me, his gaze was cold and unemotional and sent prickles up my arms. The old man opened the door fully, silently gesturing us in.

Paul looked back at me. He must have seen how uneasy I was because he smiled sadly.

"Come on, kiddo." He said trying to be reassuring. He nudged me forward, letting me pass him and enter the house first. I could have slapped him, he must have known how much the hulking old man frightened me. He sneered at the old man as I passed him, angling my body away from him. His cloths smelled of cigar smoke and I couldn't help wrinkling my nose. Paul walked in after me and I was thankful for the human buffer, having my back to the old man made me uneasy.

He closed the door as soon as we were securely in suffocating the modest light the outside granted. My mind raced in the darkness and I felt almost panicked enough to reach out for Paul, but I restrained myself.

"Alright!" The old man called into the darkness. The deep hum of a generator rumbled the floor and the dim lights awakened slowly. The house smelled like mold and sawdust and the untreated wooden floors were dipping and warped. A grainy television propped on aged cinder blocks gave off more light than the naked light bulbs dangling from the ceiling did. The man lounging in the worn couch smiled warmly at me as he itched his scalp and stifled a yawn. It was Connor I realized and I felt sick again. I shot a disbelieving glance at Paul. How could he have brought me to this place? What the hell was he thinking? He had lost his mind, I deduced, and I was just as much of a fool for trusting him in the slightest. When I saw the pistol laying on the coffee table just inches away from Connors leg I knew I had to take matters into my own hands. I couldn't stay here, not if I wanted to make it out of this thing alive.

Paul nudged me toward the next room and I did my best to navigate the warped hardwood floor with my blurry sleep deprived vision. The threshold of the kitchen was a good three inches lower than the makeshift living room and my foot fumbled over it almost causing me to lose my balance.

Murphy stood in the open door of a yellowed, buzzing refrigerator stretching. He gave me a sad smile when he caught sight of me awkwardly shuffling into the room.

"Are you hungry?" Paul asked softly. I shook my head vehemently, fatigue robbing me of my appetite

"Better get some sleep then." He offered. He led me up the stairs that attached to the kitchen and I tried not to notice the moldy, pealing wallpaper. The railing was wobbly and the stairs creaked and shifted under me. They would be impossible to sneak down I realized. Getting out of here was going to take some serious forethought.

The room they lent me was lit by a sting of white Christmas lights stapled to the far wall. The wood floor was brittle under my sneakers and I suspected it was littered with sharp splinters. I kicked my shoes off anyway and laid them neatly at the foot of the makeshift bed. The room was quite large, the dim light of the Christmas lights only illuminating three quarters of it. The single window, like all the others was tightly tapped with black garbage bags. I ran my fingers across the plastic seams gauging their thickness and strength. I stood there completely still for a few minutes, trying to decide if now was the time to make my move. With the widows tapped shut as they were I had no way to determine if I could climb to the ground without being seen or seriously injured. I could rip the garbage bags open but if I decided that the climb down was too dangerous I would have to find an exit on the ground floor and with at least three men prowling around down stairs at any given time the chances of slipping out unnoticed and having at least enough time to reach my apartment and pack what little provisions I needed before jumping into my car and hauling ass for home were dismally slim.

My legs were beginning to twitch with fatigue. I slowly came to realize that I would have to rest for at least a few hours before I would be in any state to attempt an escape. It was an irritating realization.

I slept in fits and starts at first, waking with the gut churning fear of not immediately recognizing my surroundings. I lulled myself back into a dreamless rest although I wanted nothing more than cry one moment and run for my life the next. When I woke properly it was five in the evening the next day. My blood sugar had plunged while I slept and my quivering legs had just enough strength to carry me down the stairs.

The kitchen was empty and the murmuring of the graining television couldn't be heard echoing from the next room. I waited on the threshold for as long as I dared, but the swaying of my legs made me fear that I would faint right there on the bottom stair. I stepped gingerly onto the cold pealing linoleum of the kitchen and wished immediately that I had slipped my shoes on before venturing down the stairs. I strode silently to the refrigerator nudged between the wall and filthy oven. It contence were sparse, ancient looking condiments and an assortment of skunky looking beers. Defeated I slouched into one of the several rickety plastic lawn chairs that served as kitchen furniture. I noted that the rumbling of the generator was absent, and after a few moments of rest I had welled up enough strength and courage to investigate.

The house was old, built in the fashion of those old scenic farm houses, the kind with large seemingly random rooms. It was probably once a very nice house, but years of miss use, or no use at all had taken their toll. The father my trembling legs wandered around the more amazed I became as to the building's actually size. The first floor had three bathrooms, although only one had a functioning toilet and the other two were had walls fuzzy with black mold. Several of what I could only assume were bedrooms were crammed one against another and formed a sort of domestic maze. I could not imagine someone being able to afford cooling the colossal house in the summer, let alone heating it in the harsh winter.

Fearing I would lose myself in the house I slowly made my way back, finally settling into the threadbare sofa. It smelled like cigar smoke but I wearily pulled my feet up and laid with my head on the arm, trying to ignore the dull ache of the wood pressing through the padding. I must have dozed off then, watching the clock on the VCR blink 12:00.

I caught a glimpse of the overgrown back lawn as the door swung open. I didn't bother to sit up, I felt inexplicably dizzy and every movement of my head made me a woozy mess. Murphy nudged into the house, hair plastered to his forehead in the rain. Connor followed close behind, three pizza boxes stacked in his arms. I don't think I was ever happier to see mass murders.

Four slices of Pizza and several minutes of stiff small talk later I slumped on the domesticated lawn chair.

"Paul should show up sometime tonight." Murphy said between mouthfuls of now cold Pizza.

I solemnly nodded my thanks.

I crawled up the uneven stairs feeling less shaky but still unnerved by my prescience in the house and among its people. The old man's absence had not gone unnoticed but I thought asking would be awkward and unnecessary.

I tried to get some sleep on the lumpy bed but it evaded me. My stomach had resumed its somersaulting. I was reduced to pacing the floor, doing my vest to avoid the horrendous splinters littering the floor. It must have been at least 45 minutes before I heard the stairs grown. I jumped to my feet with one motion but waited for the knock at my door before I eased it open. Paul loomed in the dim hall, the shoulders of his brown jacket wet with the persistent drizzle. His hair was damp and his eyes looked dim.

"Hi." He greeted unenthusiastically.

"How is she?" I asked. My voice sounded frail but stern to me. He shrugged.

"No change." He answered.

I felt as though a little part of me had collapsed. I supposed that despite everything I truly knew I still held out that glimmer of childish hope that Deb would snap out of it. My expression must have mirrored my internal distress because Paul unexpectedly pulled me into a stiff hug. If I hadn't felt so numb inside I would have felt embarrassed and awkward. I wasn't used to seeing Paul be affectionate and I found it almost humorous. Maybe if I hadn't been so angry with him I would have felt somewhat reassured that Paul felt the need to comfort me in his awkward way. I almost felt like crying as Paul stroked my back with large sweaty palms, I yearned to let the big angry tears gush down my face but I suspected that if I started I would never stop. I tried to smile as we pulled away from each other but its half-heartedness was evident.

"Here" He said as he handed me a plastic grocery bag. Inside were my crumpled pajama's and a fresh pair of scrubs.

"Thanks" I mumbled.

"So, what now? I asked when the air between us had grown sufficiently stale.

"Do you want to stay in Boston?" Paul asked starkly. The question caught me off guard.

"I don't know" I answered automatically.

"Well, think about it for me."

Suddenly I was terrified, If Paul meant to move me out of the city than things were worse that I had previously imagined.

Paul took his leave shortly after, I tried to get some sleep but it was useless. I could hear Connor and Murphy murmuring to each other down the stairs, as well as the noisy din of the television. The murmuring ceased at about one in the morning and I waited another hour just to make sure. I threw on my dirt pajamas and tightly laced up my sneakers. I took the stairs one step at a time, grasping my identification card to keep my house key and car key from clanging nosily against each other. My heat hammered against my rib cage the entire tedious trip down the stairs. I navigated my way through the pitch black kitchen, feeling my way past the plastic chairs and cold moldy walls.

The television in the next room cast the only light, making the empty beer bottles gleam. Connor snored softly sprawled on the couch as Murphy slumbered fitfully on the stained arm chair. I held my breath as I crept past them. The gun on the coffee table caught my eye and my blood ran inexplicably cold. Somehow I found myself in the next room, navigating the darkness again. I slammed my foot against a wall once and froze in place sure that I had been heard. When apprehension did not come I continued much more carefully. My hands were shaking by the time I reached the moldy unused bathroom. I secured the door behind me as quietly as I could.

I crossed the room to where a sink had once been and where only a dripping pipe remained. My hands spread across the foul smelling wall searching for the window. After a few seconds of useless searching I had almost let myself believe that I had entered the wrong bathroom when my fingers fumbled across the black plastic of the garbage bag that sealed the window closed. I dug my nails into the plastic and ripped at it as franticly as I could all the while try to be as silent as possible. I let the ruined plastic pool at my feet. The window unlatched with surprising ease but lifting the damn thing was another story completely. The glass was warped with age and the frame was very heavy, it took all the strength I could muster to lift it. The cold air that blew against my face was unbelievably soothing, and I hadn't realized until just then how much I was sweating.

I secured the window in place leaving just enough room for me to crawl out of. Fearful that the window would not hold I pulled myself through it as carefully as I could. Swinging my legs over the ledge I braced for the fall. As I suspected I lost my balance and landed on the wet stony ground in a heap, tearing the knees of my pajamas out not to mention the palms of my hands. I collected myself quickly and counted to twenty in my head trying to calm myself. My eyes adjusted to the starless night after a few seconds as I began my march out of the overgrown jungle of the yard. My heart hammered so loudly I hardly noticed the thorn bushes and weeds scrapping my legs. When I reached the wet uneven pavement I ran.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

By the time I reached my block my throat was raw and my chest was burning. I only glimpsed a few cars and almost no people. Diving behind bushes and trees every time I sensed headlights coming toward me was not something that I would classify as fun and my already torn up knees were now bleeding through the thin soft fabric of my pajamas. I knew I must have looked a mess; my unwashed hair was barely being contained by my hair tie and my face and chest slick with sweat.

I approached the apartment building from the back parking lot. I had to cross a yard and hop a tall fence to get there; I simply couldn't risk being seen from the street. The parking lot was fairly large and unkempt. Large cavernous pot holes decimated the paving and collected murky mini oceans of rain water.

I crossed the back parking lot at a sprint, dodging the pot holes as shiftily as I could, reaching the door I fumbled with my keys. I managed to steady my hands long enough to open the door. I took the stairwell and by the time I reached my floor I thought I was going to be violently ill with exertion.

I sprinted down my hall, trying to muffle my footfalls and panting as much as I could. I unlocked opened and relocked my door in one swift motion. I stood in the hallway of my apartment listening for the slightest sound that would betray an intruder's presence over the thundering of my frantic heart. I heard nothing and only jumped when my cat rubbed my leg and did her best to trip me as I made my way slowly down the hall. I checked every room and when I satisfied that no one was waiting to murder me I ran into my bedroom. I fumbled for the blinds in the dark and when I was sure they were tightly closed I jumped over my bed and flicked the light on. I began to tear my closet apart, grabbing my large burgundy duffle bag and my safe. I shoved the locked briefcase into the duffle bag along with three of four pairs of shirts and jeans, basically anything I could lay my hands on.

My cat was grooming herself mindlessly when I snatched her off the bed and bolted for the door. I paused in the hall trying to decide whether or not I had forgotten anything vital. The cat squirmed in my arms, kicking me savagely with her back feet but I tightened my grip around her and tried to steady my breathing.

I unlocked the door as quietly as I could, grimacing when the bolt clanked. I inched the door open. There was no sound in the hallway. No motion what so ever so I welled my bravery and peered down one end of the hallway and then the other. No one.

I sprinted down the hallway, not caring to even attempt to mute my strides on the slightly dirty cream carpet. When I reached the stairwell door I slammed into it with my back as my arms were preoccupied straining to keep the heavy duffle bag from dragging the floor and strangling my cat into submission. At the opposite end of the hall I could hear the elevator moving. My stomach lurched sickeningly and suddenly, as though I wasn't in a rush already, a new sort of fire was lit under my ass and I bonded down the first flight of stairs so fast I was shocked that I hadn't tripped. Sickening disbelieve washed over me when I heard the door reopen above me and the thundering of booted feet bouncing off the walls and down the stairwell. If I was lucky it was Paul or one of the Saints, but I always had shitty luck so I wasn't going to count on it.

I ran for a long time and seemed to be going nowhere. The hammering of my heart and the scorching of my lungs were intense. When I crashed through the door into the night it was sprinkling again and a bead of sweat lingering on my forehead gained enough momentum to roll down my face and drip in my eye. I blinked back the stubborn welting tear forming in that eye, knowing that I had to keep all my senses sharp in this last leg of my escape, especially now that I was being actively pursued. A moment of panic washed over me when I realized that I didn't precisely know where I had parked my car. I knew I couldn't exactly stop and ponder about it so I ran blindly into the parking lot, at least I could find some cover there if all else failed.

The gunshot rattled my right ear drum and I tripped in my instinctive attempt to hit the deck. I managed to angle my body in the fall so that my now frantic feline would not sustain the blunt trauma of the plummet. My right shoulder took the most damage and I knew that in the morning I would have a nasty deep bruise that would pain me for weeks to come, assuming of course that I hadn't been shot and would see the next morning. When I saw movement from my far right peripheral I fumbled to my feet, now seriously straining with my crammed duffle bag. I know I should have dropped it but without it I wouldn't make it out of the city let alone the state.

I gained my feet and resumed my sprint although not without significant difficulty. I ventured a glance over my throbbing right shoulder and glimpsed a short balding man fumbling with a hand gun. He face was flushed and panicked and he took large stumbling steps backwards. Boots pounding the pavement grabbed my attention and I caught sight of Murphy crashing thorough puddles of muddy rainwater. He scaled the fence that ran the perimeter of the complex franticly, the chains clacking nosily. He was up and over the fence in one short bound squinting in the drizzle that was slowly becoming a steady rain.

Although Murphy was assumable coming to my rescues I knew that his original intention was to recapture me. As flattering as it was to know that Paul felt the need to protect me, I didn't exactly enjoy him sicking his dogs on me, although I did appreciate their sense of timing.

I saw the dull gleam of Murphy's gun as it grew slick with rain. He drew it effortlessly from beneath the folds of his wool coat. I didn't hear the shots, the silencer elongated the barrel and smothered the sound of it firing but thin snakes of smoke writhed from the barrel. The man behind me managed to squeeze two more fumbling shots off, one whizzing audibly by me before I located my car. I had only just enough time to unlock the door and hurl the cat and bag inside when the thundering of boots on the wet pavement began to follow me again. I dove into the car just as Murphy reemerged behind the army of slumbering vehicles. I turned the engine on and slapped the automatic locking mechanism as Murphy reached my passenger side door. The drizzle had given way to a hard rain, pelting the roof of my car savagely.

His palms beat on the wet windows with a fury that I was sure would shatter it.

"UNLOCKTHEFUCKIN'DOOR" He raged, water streaming off his face and sticking his dark hair to his forehead. Steam rose in thin tendrils from his temples. I was frozen in fear for some inexplicable reason. Perhaps the realization that he had just murdered a man in my apartment parking lot had struck me, or maybe it was the sudden death of the already shaky confidence in my escape attempt.

The back door of the apartment slammed open expelling Connor and a disheveled looking Paul. Murphy glanced over his shoulder to yell something I could not discern to them. I put the car in drive and speed out so fast I fishtailed slightly on the wet pockmarked pavement.

* * *

I knew they tried to follow me, I heard the wheels of some unseen vehicle squeal after me. I knew I should have parked somewhere to ensure my vehicular escape was not foiled like my little trip to the apartment was but I was shaking and almost delirious. I don't remember the drive to Kathleen's, or even stepping out of the car and walking onto her porch. I do remember thanking god that her porch was enclosed enough to shield me from the hammering rain although the mesh screening did little to hinder the now whipping wind. I remember the sickening lurch my stomach made when the police sirens became audible over the thundering rain.

I beat furiously at the door for what seemed like an hour. The porch light flashed on suddenly, blinding me temporarily.

"Kathleen?" I yelled over the downpour.  
"It's Lidia. Please open up." my voice quavered and cracked.

I heard the bolt slowly slide open and the door opened only as far as the cheep amber chain lock would allow. Half of Kathleen's weathered features pressed against the doorframe. I could see she was dough eyed with sleep but those eyes widened to behold me shivering and pooling rainwater on her porch. She swung the door open as fast as her frail arthritic hands could manage.

"What the hell, Lidia?"

I stepped in and basked in the warmth and dryness of the house.

"Are you alright? What's happened? You're bleeding!" Kathleen exclaimed gesturing at the torn material of my pajamas that exposed the deep gashes I had obtained during my ungraceful fall from the window. The cuts had reopened, probably due to my fence hoping adventure and the running, and were now weeping thick streams of blood that my pajamas were wicking up making the wounds look that much more gruesome.

Before I could even try to explain myself Kathleen had grabbed my wrist and dragged me into her kitchen. She instructed me to hop up on her counter while she rummaged through her cupboards. I didn't protest for reasons I couldn't quite place. Maybe I simply wanted to delay the panicked explanation, or maybe I was just too tired.

The kitchen wasn't dirty but it smelled old. The stray cobwebs clung stubbornly to the corners of the ceiling. The room was long and lean with a humming refrigerator and aging stove. The cupboards ran the length of the room on both sides and my feet dangled over the counter. I swung them absent mindedly listening to my sneakers clatter on the hollow wood.

Kathleen reemerged from the cupboards with a bottle of rubbing alcohol and a handful of waded tissues. Before I could react she dowsed the tissues with the alcohol over the sink at attacked my bloody knees. I hissed as the sting sunk into to my legs.

"Don't be such a baby!"

I rolled my eyes and despite the burning of my knees I somehow felt better.

"Hold this" she instructed and I reluctantly pressed the tissue against my right knee, the more battered of the two. She limped to the other side of the room and dragged a chair noisily across the floor. She eased herself slowly into it and I tried not to notice the audible grinding noise her knee made.

"I was worried about you, kid." She said wearily rubbing sleep from her eyes.

I didn't understand at first and then I realized that it had been an entire day since Deb had been gunned down so savagely in the parking lot of the morgue. That kind of thing was big news, even in a place like Boston, and Kathleen was bound to have heard about it.

"That man came around, that FBI agent. Asking all these questions about if I had noticed anyone new or suspicious around the dinner. I don't think I offered a lot of help to be honest."

The stinging in my knees had almost faded completely and I balled the bloody tissues in my hand.

"He gave me his card if I remembered anything of use."

She was blathering I realized, trying to fill the silent void between us, perhaps trying to ease the details of my sudden and shocking appearance on her porch.

"Can you watch my cat for a few days?" I blurted unemotionally.

She looked up at me. From my higher vantage I could see the tapestry of lines and deep set wrinkles that tarnished her face. Here meticulously plucked eyebrows furrowed and her lips pressed into a firm line of concern. I saw her green-grey eyes betray a hint of hurt.

"I'm sorry." I murmured staring at the crumpled ball of blood blotched tissue held firmly in my grip as though it were the most fascinating thing I've ever seen. Let's just be out with it, I thought.

"I'm going home… for a little while."

Silence enveloped us. It was hushed for so long that I ventured a glance as Kathleen. She chewed her bottom lip, opened her mouth to say something but closed it again. I felt my face flash hot. Why was this so hard?

"I'll be back in a week or so. I just need some time away." That was too impersonal I realized.

"I can't stay here, not right now. Not after everything."

That seemed to appease her.

"Okay." She said, glassy eyes peering up at me.

I hoped off the counter and felt my stinging knees wobble under me. I steadied myself on the counter and prayed that Kathleen didn't notice. She rose slowly, her right knee again grinding audibly as she gained her feet. She stared at me searchingly for a moment or two before leading me toward the door. I braved the rain again to retrieve the napping cat from my car. She began her wriggling struggle but I managed to get her in the door before she decided to sink her sharp little teeth into the meat of my wrist.

"Did you trip?" Kathleen asked solemnly as I tossed the cat through the door.

"What?"

"Your knees."

"Oh, yeah. In the parking lot, I twisted my ankle. "I lied.

She nodded.

The cat began to rub Kathleen's ankles at a furious pace.

"I'll see you next week." She said.

"Next week."

I made a slight move to angle myself out the door when she pounced on me, crushing me into what would be my second awkward hug of the day.

"It'll be okay," she offered, her words muffled against my shoulder. My breath caught in my chest and I tied to dissolve the knot in my throat before we pulled away. Her eyes brimmed with tears._Please don't say that_ I repeated to myself.

I only stopped twice the entire way home, once to fill my tank and stock my car on junk food and once again to refill my tank and empty my bladder. The city gave way to seemingly endless stretches of highway and although I was fairly confident I knew the way back thanks to countless Christmas and midsummer visits home, in my sleep deprived state I was paranoid about missing my exits and if I had the appropriate amount of quarters to appease the toll booths. It took me a nearly seven hour drive not counting the useless two hour rest I took at a sleazy truck stop. I sat in my car listening to the idling of massive trucks spewing exhaust into the frigid air and trying to sleep. I got a good hour of rest in between bouts of useless repositioning in the ridged driver's seat.

The landscape changed subtlety but radically. The harsh somewhat flatter land dotted with thin blankets of trees of Massachusetts gave way slowly to the deep valleys and high lushly forested mountains of New York. It seemed warmer to; the cruel ocean winds couldn't wreak their havoc here. Still the early spring could be a bleak time, drenching rain that lasts for days on end coupled with the melting snow made the spring almost as dreary as the winter.

The closer I got to my home town the heavier the knot in my stomach grew. A sudden surge of panic began to course through me as I entered my small home town. I wanted nothing more but to drive to my mother's house and fling myself at her, to tell her everything that had transpired and finally get some sleep, but Deb's ruined face kept springing into my mind and I knew I couldn't go home. There was no way for me to be sure I hadn't been followed and I couldn't compromise my family's safety the way I had compromised Deb's. I would have to find my own way out of this cluster-fuck

* * *

Wow, it's been a while people. Sorry about the wait, my life has taken some very hectic turns lately. I've felt a little guilty about holding out on you guys, I have to confess that I have had a few of these chapters floating around on my computer for a very long time. I hit a little bit of a snag on this story and I didn't want to post anything until i had worked my way out of it. In the mean time I have been working of some other things, mostly one shots that I hope to have up in a few months. Thanks for bearing with me.

NocturnalRose, I know, running always exacerbates the situation. But it wouldn't be interesting if she made well informed decisions would it? :)

ExploitingReality, Thank you very much! What really frustrated me when I started reading fanfiction was the ever prevalent helpless, mindless female characters with no personality. When I started writing this my biggest goal was to create a female character that was not a random and slightly nonsensical love interest with no sense of self preservation or opinion of her own, but at the same time was just a vulnerable and terrified as any real person would be when thrust into uber violent situations.

Kitsmits, Thank you, your flattery is very appreciated. It's great to have readers who are so perceptive, I hope my attempt to make Lidia a nonmarysue was not too obvious, I didn't want her to appear to be trying too hard to prove herself a capable female. As for my knowledge about pathology, I am about a year away from gaining my license as a Registered Nurse and I hope to go on to gain my license in forensic nursing. Pathology is just one of my many weird interests. I pride myself on Lidia's character not being an immediate romance; I never really understood the attraction (other than the obvious physical one) of two mass murderers on the run.

Have a Happy New Year everyone!


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